Those Three Little Words
by Oh.srsly.mhm
Summary: College AU. For Tino Väinämöinen, going to college was certain to be a breeze. What he wasn't ready for were the insane students, a lovable snow white puppy, and an extremely frightening, tall, frightening, expressionless Swede. Oh, and did he mention frightening? Eventual Sufin / Sweden x Finland and many more Hetalia pairings.
1. Prologue

Three words. Just three words can flip your life upside down, and turn it completely around. I found out the hard way that sometimes, words speak just a bit louder than actions. This is the story of how those three little words, spoken by Berwald Oxenstierna, changed my life forever.

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Oh! Perhaps I should introduce myself! My name is Tino Väinämöinen and during the time of this particular story, I was nineteen years old. I live in America, yet I don't have a single drop of American blood in me. My family moved from Finland when I was just five years old, so I don't have many memories of my homeland, and I probably speak better English than Finnish.

Unfortunately, this story doesn't begin with a dramatic opening, or with a life changing event. No, this story just opens with my acceptance into college – which I was no doubt thrilled about. Throughout elementary school, to middle school, and finally to high school, grades were always very important to me, and it had always been one of my goals to be accepted into a top notch college. When I received that diploma to my college of choice (Hetalia University), I couldn't have been happier! In the process of my loud and exaggerated victory dance around my small house, I broke one of my mother's glass trinkets sitting on the short coffee table in the sitting room (where I happened to be when I opened the letter), a dish or two (I had been eating at the time), and probably vexed all of our neighbors on the street due to the commotion, but at that moment, I couldn't care less. After receiving tight hugs from my younger sister and brother, a tearful embrace from my mother (and then a slap to the back of the head for breaking the ornament), and a proud clap to the shoulder from my father, realization hit me; was I really ready for this? I was barely nineteen; all this time, I had been so determined, so pushed to get accepted into the college of my dreams. I had thought I would've been ready to do this – but in reality, I was scared to death.

While the University was not that far away, I would still have to live on campus, which means that I would probably have to share a room with a roommate who I hadn't even met. That was a little bit terrifying. Would my roommate be a tall, scary guy who could intimidate someone with just a glare? And could I handle the work load? Would I be able to get through college and graduate?

However, I couldn't just throw away this opportunity! I had worked hard, and I wasn't going to throw it away due to the chance that I could have an unpleasant roommate. I found myself actually excited to start my time at Hetalia University in the fall. Soon, the cold spring soon turned into a toasty, cheerful summer, and before I knew it, autumn had come. And you know what comes along with the beginning of autumn? The beginning of a new school year! The time soon came where I packed up many of my belongings, gave embraces to my tearful family members, got in my trusty, light blue bug (which I had received for my high school graduation), and started the journey to Hetalia University that would ultimately change my life.

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A/N

Hello and welcome to my first story on Fanfiction! As of right now, I'm still sorting out the plot of the story, but the main parts have mostly been defined.

Tell me what you think! Thank you so much for reading!

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Continued in the next chapter..


	2. New Guy Tino

The University was located right in the center of New York City, and because I lived in Dover, Delaware, my trip roughly took around three and a half hours.

I'll skip out on all of the boring, unimportant registration forms that I had to fill out once I arrived at the college. Needless to say, at the end of the entire ordeal, I was exhausted and just wanted to find my room so that I could sleep. This scared me, for I was once again reminded that I would have to share a room with someone I had never met before. I received the key to my room, which was located in the northern hemisphere of the campus, and taking most of my belongings from my car, began the trudge to the place I would be residing for a while – dorm 143.

The adventure to my dorm seemed to be quite insane; there was the loud buzz of students' chatter coming from the numerous rooms, someone kept shouting, "Der spiste den sidste donut?!" with a seemingly Scandinavian accent, one student was busy bedazzling…_his_ door, and I was forced to stand against the wall to avoid getting run over by a tall, albino student and a girl with long, brown hair chasing him. And wait…was that a frying pan in her hands? Shaking my head disbelievingly, I finally made it to my dorm and pulled out my key.

Opening the door slowly, I peeped inside, a bit frightened. The lights were already on, which indicated that my roommate was already here. Pulling the door a bit wider, I stepped inside and placed my bags near the door to take a look around. The dorm was nice enough, but at the time I was worried more about my roommate. Hearing rummaging from probably a bedroom, I picked my bags back up, and slowly made my way to the noise. Nearing the room where the rummaging was coming from, I knocked on the door softly. "Hello?"

The rummaging stopped and the door was pulled open. The boy who pulled open the door was just a bit taller than I, had slightly long brown hair, and kind green eyes. He smiled when he saw me, and immediately stuck out his hand. "I'm guessing you're my roommate! My name is Toris Laurinaitis."

Shaking his hand with a huge smile on my face, I quickly introduced myself immediately after. I was extremely excited with how this had worked out; Toris seemed like a really nice guy, and he would probably make a great roommate. Our friendship quickly escalated; I forgot my exhaustion almost immediately, and we spent the rest of the afternoon unpacking our bags and talking about ourselves and our families. Toris was from Philadelphia, and, like me, had wanted to study at Hetalia University from a very early age. As of right now, he was studying to become a surgeon. Him and two of his good childhood friends had all been accepted to the college, and were apparently five doors down.

"I'll have to introduce you to them soon. They're both very kind and pretty smart – Eduard is a computer genius and Raivis graduated high school two years early. It's pretty crazy that we were all accepted into the same college," Toris spoke while setting up his DVD player in his room.

"Speaking of crazy," I mentioned, while handing him a cord, "the students seem pretty crazy themselves. If I stayed out there even a bit longer, I probably would've witnessed someone get murdered by a frying pan!"

Toris laughed quietly as he finished connecting the plugs. "So I've heard. When I first got here, I saw someone trying to fit a grand piano into their room. I didn't hear about this near-murder though." He chuckled again. "I'm sure everyone here isn't insane like that, and that the excitement will disappear in a few days, with all of the work we'll receive from our classes."

"So girls and boys are allowed to share the same dorms? I saw a few girls in the same hall as us," I wondered aloud.

Toris shook his head. "The one thing that always confused me about this certain university was the fact that instead of separating girls and guys, they've separated the dorm halls into grades. I believe that the girl rooms are at the end of the hall, while the boys are at the other end. A bit strange, yes?" he asked me.

"Definitely," I said while nodding my head. I stood up and dusted off my pants. "Did we successfully connect the DVD player?"

He nodded and gave me a small smile. "I'm pretty sure we have. If we did do something wrong, I'll just have Eduard come by and take a look."

"Sounds good!" I replied. I was just going to suggest that we go out and get a quick bite to eat since it was getting late, when there was a sharp knock at the door. Exchanging a quick, confused look, me and Toris approached the door. Opening it, I realized that it was the boy who had been bedazzling his dorm room before.

"Like, hey boys!" he exclaimed. Apparently he had changed, for he now wore a white sweater and a short skirt that was a sickening shade of pink. He leaned against the doorframe and threw a quick wink and a sly smirk to both of us.

"H-hello," Toris sputtered. Glancing at him from the side, I could see that a faint blush adorned his cheekbones; I figured at the time that it was just from the heat coming from the room.

"So me and a few others are going to totally get some ice cream at the ice cream shop down a block or two away, and I was in charge of asking people, so you, like, wanna come?" the boy asked, only looking at Toris.

Toris finally tore his gaze away from the messenger to face me. "How does that sound, Tino?"

"Sounds fun to me!" I replied, nodding. The boy in the skirt told us to meet at the front of the University in five minutes, gave us a quick thumbs up, winked at Toris, and then ran off, presumably to another dorm. Not wanting to be late, we tugged our coats on, and then walked off in the direction of the meeting place. Once there, we noticed that there were a few others waiting around for the others. Toris immediately jogged up to two in particular; one was a tall blonde with glasses, and the other was a short boy, who seemed to be shivering due to the cold. These were the infamous Eduard von Bock and Raivis Galante that I had heard about only a few hours before. I introduced myself, and right after, the boy in the pink skirt came back and told us to, "Like, start walking in like, that direction."

The walk to the parlor was a pleasant one; both Eduard and Raivis seemed very kind and polite and were glad that Toris had gotten what Eduard called, "a satisfactory roommate". The boy in the pink skirt seemed to have an interest in Toris; once or twice he 'bumped' into him, and I heard him tell my new friend, "Dude, you're like, totally hot." I didn't hear what Toris had to say after that.

The ice cream parlor was very close indeed; we only walked for about five minutes until we reached our destination. The name of the parlor interested me the most; the bright words 'Big Gay Ice Cream Shop' stood out in the darkening, crisp, autumn evening. I rolled my eyes at the title, but my eye-rolling soon turned into an eye widening.

"Perkele!" I hissed.

"Is something wrong, Tino?" Raivis asked timidly.

Laughing in disbelief, I uttered, "Everything is fine, I just forgot to bring my wallet."

Getting out his own, Eduard said, "I could buy you one, it would be no problem."

This was certainly out of the question. I had just met Eduard, and I was certainly not going to have him pay for my ice cream, especially when the store was named "Big Gay Ice Cream Shop." Shaking my head, I replied, "Oh, no thank you! I'll get my money; I'll just be a minute or two!"

Toris tilted his head. "Do you want me to come with you? Do you know the way back?"

Again I shook my head. "No – I'll be fine! Don't eat too much without me!" And with that, I started a brisk jog back towards the university. Thankfully, the college was on the same street as the colorful ice cream shop, and I found myself in the freshman dorm hall in no time at all.

Apparently, the remaining students in the dorm who hadn't gone to get ice cream were having a limbo party, right there, in the middle of the hall. I'm not joking; two students held a pole and people were taking turns limboing while the rest of the students cheered them on. Complete with the music. The pole was set pretty low, and the only two contestants left were a girl with long, platinum blonde hair in a deep purple dress, and a loud, obnoxious boy in a leather bombing jacket. Unfortunately, I couldn't pass the limbo contest, because the sides of the hall were filled with people watching the two compete.

A boy with wild, blonde hair and bright blue eyes seemed to be head of this ordeal, so I approached him. "Excuse me?" I asked above the cheers and whistles from the crowd.

"Yeah? What's up?" he replied with a grin.

I recognized his voice as the same one who had been calling out about a donut earlier that day. "Can I get through? My room is on the other side of this whole event, and I can't get through," I pointed to the stuffed sides of the hall.

He seemed to laugh and shouted over the crowd, "Dude, if you want to get through, you got to limbo!"

I shook my head in disbelief. "What?"

He suddenly got everybody's attention by giving a shrill whistle that made me cover my ears. "Yo, we have a challenger!" The crowd seemed to grow even wilder, and I now understood.

"No! I just want to get through! I don't want to limbo!" Both contestants cleared the way and I suddenly found myself pushed to the front of the now, very low bar. I inwardly groaned as the headman of the limbo tournament started a cheer apparently for me, by shouting, "New Guy! New Guy! New Guy!" Soon the crowd was chanting the vacuous cheer.

Deciding to get this over with, I began approaching the bar, and by some power above, actually made it under. Standing back up, I was given hard slaps to the back, and loud bravos of "New Guy!" I smiled unwillingly and made my way to the back of the crowd, which parted like the Red Sea. At this point, I was out of breath and began to run through the corridor. However, before I could make to my room, the organizer called out to me, "New Guy! You should play again later! We're having a rematch at eleven tonight!"

Still jogging, I looked over my shoulder. "We'll see!" I called out, giggling. Before I could look forwards again, I literally ran into someone. I found myself on the floor, along with another person, who seemed busy picking up various boxes and papers that he must've been carrying at the time. I noticed that the door right next to mine was open, probably signifying two things: that he had been busy carrying something to his room, and that he was my next-door roommate. Great first impressions, Tino. Just brilliant.

"Oh my gosh! I am so sorry! Are you okay? Here, let me help you!" I rambled as I felt an embarrassed flush spread over my face like wildfire. Standing back up, I held out a stack of papers I had picked up. "Here you go…" I exclaimed as I looked up.

The student I had run into was a huge, frightening man. He had short, light blonde hair, and he seemed to be glaring at me from above through his glasses. Right behind those glasses was a pair of eyes, which were a shade of bright, brilliant aqua that I didn't even think was possible.

"I'm so sorry!" Frightened to the bone, I basically shoved the papers into his arms, slipped through beside him, whipped out my key and opened my door in record time, throwing myself into my room, still terrified by him. Deciding that I didn't want to brave the scary dude, the limbo fest, and the gay ice cream shop again, I sent a quick text to Toris, telling him that I was just going to stay home for the night. After calling my family about my registration day, I got into my bed and tried not to think of the crazy college that I would call home for the next couple years.

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A/N

Don't worry! The plot will definitely pick up in the next chapter! As you can probably already tell, my stories will most likely be on the lighter side, however there will be some serious parts.

I try my best to get the closest translations, but unfortunately I'm not fluent in those languages, so I apologize if in any of my stories the translation is wrong. If you see a problem with any translation, let me know! I would greatly appreciate it!

Let me know what you think! Thanks so much for reading!

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Continued in the next chapter..


	3. We Meet (Again)

Unfortunately, I didn't get the best night of sleep in the first night at my new dorm. I was continually woken up by loud limbo music throughout the night and had nightmares of having to continually limbo with that humungous crowd watching me.

I woke up somewhat late the next morning, since classes started the next day and I had nothing better to do. Walking into the kitchen, I discovered that Toris was already up and moving, for he had a fresh pot of coffee brewing, and bless his soul, it looked like he had saved enough for me. Exchanging good mornings, our talk soon changed to the topic of last night.

"We missed you last night. Apparently the owner is from Cuba and can make a pretty delicious vanilla ice cream," Toris murmured while sipping his coffee.

"I would've liked to come, things just got a bit overwhelming here," I replied while taking a sip of my own. "There was a huge limbo fest going on when I came back, and I was forced to myself when trying to get through the hall!"

He raised his eyebrows. "Oh, so are you the 'New Guy' that Mathias and everyone were referring to last night?"

I tilted my head at him, a bit confused. "Who's Mathias?"

Toris looked up at me. "He was the organizer of the limbo tournament yesterday night. I ran into him when coming back to the dorms."

Connecting the name to the face, I nodded. "Oh, so he's the wild-haired donut man."

Toris looked at me, puzzled. "Who?"

I waved at him, "Oh, no one. That was just how I remembered him until now." I added two sugar cubes to my coffee. "Speaking of names, did you happen to get the name of the boy in the pink skirt yesterday?" I asked him, smirking into my drink.

"I…I happened to. Yes. I did. His name is Feliks and he's from California. And…why does that matter?" Toris stammered.

"No reason." I replied, hiding my smile by taking a sip of the now too-sweetened coffee.

Clearing his throat, Toris got up and put his mug in the sink. "I might go out and tour the campus a bit more. Would you like to come?" he asked as he washed his cup.

Nodding my head, I was prepared to give a, "Certainly!" when I remembered the real reason I didn't want to leave my dorm last night. "No! I can't leave for at least another day or so!"

Toris turned to me. "Why not? I've already checked the hall; the next limbo contest isn't scheduled till Thursday, and since its Sunday, that's in four days."

I waved my hands at him while rambling. "No! You see, there's this big, scary guy who lives in the dorm right next to us! I accidentally rammed into him on the way to the room last night and I swear he looked like he was going to kill me! I can't go out there now!"

My roommate chuckled and tugged on his shoes. "No one is going to kill you Tino."

"You're right. He's probably waiting right outside my door to kidnap me and then-"

"Tino!" Toris suddenly was right in front of me and placed both hands on my shoulders. "You'll be fine! You apologized, right? You can do nothing else." Deciding that the conversation was over, he pulled on his other shoe and stood next to the door. "Are you coming?"

To be honest, I forgot about my scary neighbor almost immediately. Toris and I spent the rest of the day touring the very large campus and discovered that it had a humungous theater (the University was known for their plays), a cafeteria with so many different types of food it made my head spin, and numerous clubs and classes that I didn't even know existed. I had never heard of the 'How to become Awesome like Me' class, the 'Panda' club, or the 'Delicious Tomato' club, which only had two members.

After seeing a particularly quirky club I burst out laughing. "Hey Toris! You should join the '4 Months 2 Fab' Club!"

Toris turned to me with a strange and somewhat hurt look. "But…why? I believe this is the last day to sign up for other school activities, but what makes you think that I would ever want to join that?"

Oh, why had I said that in the first place?! Had I lost my only friend, my roommate over one stupid comment?! Desperate to win back his friendship, I uttered the words that changed my life.

"Because, I'll join whatever class you pick for me!"

A strange glint appeared in his eye at that moment. "Any class?"

I nodded wildly. "Any class!"

Seeming to be deep in thought, he responded, "Let's raise the stakes. If one of us drops out of our new class, they have to buy the other lunch for a whole week."

I pondered this for a moment. Seeing it as a fair bet, I agreed.

Nodding with the scary glint still in his eye, he turned back to the list of classes and clubs. He eyed it over for another minute or so, and finally turned to me. "I've got it." He placed his finger on the accursed paper. "Right here."

I tiptoed beside him and peeped up at the list. When my eyes finally landed on the class he had picked for me, my jaw dropped.

"Woodshop class?! Is there a particular reason why you chose that?" I asked him, completely perplexed.

He looked back at the paper with a faint smile on his face. "Oh, I don't know. I've just got a feeling that you will really despise it."

Toris had the face of an angel but the mind of the devil.

We signed up for our new after school activities, and soon after, we got some amazing Italian food from a restaurant located on the campus. The man who served our food was actually a student studying at the University, who apparently was very energetic, and was very enthusiastic about pasta. Just as we were about to retire to our dorm, we were stopped by a couple students.

"Hey, New Guy!"

Internally groaning, I turned around to find the limbo coordinator, and two other male students that I had never seen before. Both boys looked practically identical, except for the fact that one was a bit taller than the other, and had a peculiar cross hair pin clipped in his blonde hair.

Putting on a smile, I answered, "Um, hello! Feel free to call me Tino; 'New Guy' is a bit long."

He nodded. "Fair enough. Well Tino, I'm Mathias Køhler." Putting an arm around each of the boys standing next to him, he quirking his head in the shorter student's direction, and announced, "This here is Emil Stielsson," and pointing in the opposite way he continued, "And this is my bff, Lukas Bondevik!"

Emil looked like he could melt in the ground from embarrassment and Lukas looked like he couldn't care if the earth exploded in that very moment.

"While they both have different last names, they're half brothers! Emil took his mother's maiden name instead. Isn't that so cool?!" Mathias rattled on.

After I had introduced Toris to the two brothers, we continued for a while (which basically was all about Mathias telling us about his upcoming 'Bobbing for Apples' plans), until Lukas physically began dragging him away by his ear. Emil was half a step behind their heels, and they left the cafeteria without another word.

"Oh…they're a bunch of fun, aren't they?" Toris joked as he threw away his trash.

We made our way up the flight of stairs to where our dorm was located, and were in the process of rounding the corner in the hall until I quite literally bumped into someone.

I didn't even have to think who it was.

Toris took one look at the probably now pissed-off neighbor and sprinted down the hall. On the floor I looked up at the face I feared, and was rewarded with those hypnotizing sea-green eyes.

"I-I really have to stop doing that! Are you okay, sir? I'm so sorry!" I shakily stood up and offered him a hand.

Picking up his glasses, he took my hand, and standing at his full height, he wasn't as tall as I had depicted him to be.

"Are ya alright?"

Amazed that he actually wasn't yelling at me (and that he actually said something) I answered, "N-No! I'm perfectly fine!"

Que the awkward silence.

Not knowing much else to do, I said, "I think we're roommates! I-I live in dorm 143!"

He nodded. "142."

The awkward silence returned, and wanting to be on good terms with him, I stuck out my hand. "My name's Tino Väinämöinen. What's yours?"

It was at that moment that I saw his face soften, just a little bit. Not only his eyes, but his whole face looked kinder, and I realized that he actually looked quite handsome when he did that.

Woah. Where did _that_ come from?

Lost in thought, I barely heard him utter his name. "Berwald Oxenstierna."

I was about to respond when a door in the hall opened, revealing a male student with impressive eyebrows and the same boisterous boy (still in the same bomber jacket) from the limbo tournament last evening.

"This is our fifth stop to McDonald's today! How many hamburgers can you eat?! " the student with the enormous eyebrows ranted.

"McDonalds isn't just a restaurant, Artie. McDonalds is a way of life!" the other responded passionately.

"You better pay me back for all the crap from there that I've bought you. Your stomach is a bottomless pit." Their arguing continued until they left the hall, and they still could be heard outside.

Snapping back to my thoughts, I stated, "Well, I should be heading back to my dorm. My roommate is probably expecting me."

Berwald nodded, and with a "G'bye," he passed by me and went in the same direction as the two students had not ten seconds later. I walked calmly to my room and once I opened the door, I was attacked my Toris.

"O viešpatie! How are you still alive?! Is that the roommate you were scared was going to kill you? Cause I can definitely see why now!"

Still a bit in shock myself, I said, "Yeah, that's Berwald Oxenstierna, our next door neighbor. And I really need to stop physically running into him."

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A/N

Third installment is up! Let me know what you think, and, as always, thank you so much for reading!

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Continued in the next chapter...


	4. Woodshop

My new classes started the very next morning. One of these classes was woodship, which I wasn't looking forward to. In high school, I had to take it for an extracurricular class…and after the first day, my hands were covered in scrapes and filled with splinters.

Most of my first day actually went pretty smoothly. Many classes just included introductions of the professors and what we would be learning in that certain class.

Unfortunately, Toris wasn't in any of my classes, but I did see Lukas and 'Artie' (from last night) in one or two of my classes. However, I did see many familiar faces from the couple previous days near the freshman dorm hall; I would have to get their names soon.

The time soon came for woodshop, which seemed to be pretty small, depending on the minuscule classroom it took place in. When I walked in, only one person was in their seat; the teacher apparently hadn't come yet. The first person I noticed had silver white hair, and at the moment was nibbling on something that looked suspiciously like licorice. Widening my eyes, I realized that it was Emil from the night before.

Shooting a smile in Emil's direction, I sat down next to him. For a while, not a sound was heard, other than his tentative bites of licorice and both our breathing. Wanting to break the silence, I said,

"I'm Tino, I believe I met you yesterday at the food court!"

He paused, and looking at me, he murmured, "Yes, you did. I didn't get the chance to introduce myself properly because of Mathias. I'm Emil Stielsson."

I noticed that he had a peculiar accent; like Mathias' it sounded Scandinavian, but I would have to ask him about it some other time. We shook hands, and turned back towards the podium up on stage.

"Um, do you know when the professor will come?"

He shrugged. "I have no idea. I just took this class to escape the two dolts—"

At this moment, the door burst open, and expecting it to be the professor, we both turned around. However, it was probably the exact opposite.

"Look Lukas! It's your little bro! And New G—Tino!"

"—who apparently joined this class as well." Emile continued, burying his head in his hands, and muttering a quiet, "Ríða líf mitt."

I had no idea what he had just said, but I don't think that it was something that I should've repeated.

Lukas came and sat on the other side of him. In a monotone voice, he scolded, "You can't just eat licorice all day, bror. I brought you some tuna sandwiches—"

"I don't need your stupid fish sandwiches! I'm almost eighteen years old and I can take care of myself! I can eat licorice all day if I want to—"

"If you want to be overweight you can continue doing that. On the contrary, tuna is an extremely good source of selenium, niacin, vitamin B12, vitamin B6—"

"Will you just stop talking about your stupid vitamins and tell me what you are doing in this dorky class?" Emil asked coldly.

Before Lukas could reply, Mathias exclaimed, "I've always wanted to make a big wooden snowman—"

"So that it wouldn't melt in the spring." Lukas remarked dryly.

"So, I decided to take woodshop this semester so I can make one!" Mathias continued joyfully. "Lukas said that I would wreck the whole classroom, so he decided to sign up as well!"

Silence filled the classroom, until Emil broke it. "And woodshop…just had to be the exact same class that I took to escape from you two?!" I instinctively leaned away from him, for he looked absolutely livid.

Both Mathias and Lukas shrugged at the exact same time. "I need to keep an eye on you anyway," Lukas muttered.

"I keep telling you, you don't have to!"

"I'm the big brother, it's my job to."

"I can take care of myself!"

"You obviously can't. Who eats licorice for breakfast, lunch and dinner?"

"I do!"

"You need to be more like me, like your big brother."

"No!"

"Call me Big Brother."

"No!"

"Call me Big Brother."

"I said no!"

Deciding to stop the two brothers' fight, I yelled, "Does anyone know when the teacher is coming?!"

It worked, for both ceased their quarrel and looked at me. Lukas tilted his head, "That is a very good question. At the moment, it is 3:07, and our teacher hasn't come, which is a bit odd."

We waited for just a few minutes until the door opened once again. It was about ten minutes after three, and we were probably all thinking that it was the teacher, who would ramble something about how late he was, and how it would never happen again. However, the person walking through that door was the absolute last person I expected.

"Hey, Lukas, it's the 'Big Tall Scary Guy' from room 142!"

Berwald Oxenstierna walked stoically into the room, with that same glowering look on his face. Since Mathias had taken the seat next to Lukas, he took the remaining one on my right. Even though I was basically shivering internally, I wanted to welcome him, so I turned towards him and murmured a quiet, "Hi, Berwald."

He turned to me and gave me a quick nod, and grunted, which I couldn't really interpret, but I chose to believe that he was saying hello to me too.

"Is th' teacher here y't?" Even though Berwald spoke quietly, his voice seemed like a shout in the minute classroom.

I shook my head and Lukas said, "It looks like the teacher hasn't yet. I wonder if the teacher is actually going to show up."

"Maybe the teacher realized how dorky of a class he was teaching and decided to not show up."

"Emil, brother, maybe you should realize that you enrolled yourself in this so-called 'dorky class'."

"I just took it so that there would be no possible way that I wouldn't have to spend another hour with you and the Party Planner!"

"Hey! What's wrong with planning events with people?!" Mathias screeched.

It seemed that Mathias' exclamation didn't matter at all, for the two brothers continued to bicker about the class. I personally didn't really care for the class or what was taught in it; I was just enduring it so that I could get free lunch from Toris for a week.

Suddenly the quarrel stopped, and the awkward silence once again made its appearance. Distraught from it, I asked, "So, should we get a teacher and ask what to do?"

Mathias suddenly stood up and cried, "Hell no dude! Don't you know when to seize a good opportunity?!"

I tilted my head. "This is a good opportunity?"

He nodded like it was the most obvious thing in the entire world. "No teacher means no class. No class means no homework. No homework means extra free time. Extra free time means happy students."

I pondered this for a moment. "But couldn't we get in trouble for something? Like not telling the teachers? And what about our grades? We can't get any if our teacher never shows up!"

"I actually agree with Mathias. Even if it does get found out that there isn't a teacher here, we are still 'in class' and aren't 'fooling around'," Lukas stated. "If we don't get hurt, and don't ruin anything, we'll be fine."

"Helligt lort! Lukas actually agreed with me!" Mathias came and enveloped him in a humongous hug. "Have I ever told you that you're my favorite?"

"Yes," Lukas managed to say, while still being crushed in Mathias' hug. "Actually multiple times, idiot."

I realized that Berwald hadn't said anything since the moment he had walked into class, and turned towards him. "What do you think of the situation?" I asked him.

He shrugged. "There's n'thin I r'lly can do. It's a shame that we won't le'rn anythin' 'bout woodshop this ye'r."

He looked like he could've said more, but was interrupted. "So, what are we going to do this class? Bake cookies and have a bake sale while we play Pokémon?" Emil asked, still with a confused expression.

"You know, that's not a bad idea! Lukas and I can bake our famous cakes and we can sell them at my next bobbing for apples tournament!"

"You're such an idiot. I would be caught dead before baking dozens of cookies and brownies like Paula Deen—"

"It would still make us some big bucks!"

"Dream on, Mat."

The rest of the hour included Lukas, Mathias (and occasionally Emil) arguing about the unconfirmed bake sale, and if they would actually bring in Pokémon cards next time. Me and Berwald stayed silent, occasionally exchanging a word or two. Pretty soon, the clock struck four, and everyone was packing up and leaving. Emil was the first one out, followed by Lukas, who was followed by Mathias, which left me and Berwald in the class alone.

"Well…I should get back to my room to start on all of my homework," I replied.

He nodded. "I should too."

On the way back to the dorm hall, I asked him, "So tell me a bit about yourself!"

While he did shoot me a confused look, he responded, "I live 'n Wilmington 'n Del'w're—"

"Hey! I live in Delaware too! But not in Wilmington. I live in Dover." Realizing that I had totally just interrupted him, I apologized and asked him to continue. Berwald was an only child who lived with his mother and father (who were both entirely Swedish) in a house that was located by Brandywine Creek. He always owned cats growing up, but he'd always wanted to own a dog. He had heard about Hetalia University in high school, and instantly desired to go there.

As he talked more about himself, I found out that Berwald was actually a pretty nice guy. Sure, he looked like he was angry all the time, and sometimes it was hard to understand him, but once you got past that, he was a pretty kind and understanding person.

I was almost sad in a way when we reached our dorm rooms, although I don't exactly know why. "Well, I'll see you tomorrow, Berwald!"

"See ya tomorrow."

I closed the door to my room and turned around to see a discombobulated Toris eating mint ice cream from the carton while watching 'Big Bang Theory'. Once I stepped in, he looked at me. "Tino! I don't think I can go on with the '4 Months 2 Fab Club'!"

I raised an eyebrow. "Really? Why?"

"Because Feliks is the leader of the club and he was trYING TO MAKE ALL OF US WEAR SKIRTS! We're supposed to go shopping for 'fabulous' clothes tomorrow and its absolute torture!"

All this time, Toris had thrown the ice cream off his lap (which landed on the kitchen counter) and was furiously pacing around the room, ranting.

He stopped suddenly, and turned to me, with a smirk on his face. "But I can't wait to hear about your woodshop class! How was it?"

Now it was my turn to smirk. "Actually, it went great. The teacher didn't show up, and it looks like that class will just be free time."

If Toris hadn't seemed crazy before, he sure looked crazy now. "WHAT?!" He picked up the abandoned ice cream container and began eating out of it again. He finally collapsed on the couch. "This isn't fair…why do I get the worst club in the entire universe, while you get to sit for an hour twiddling your thumbs?!" Collecting himself, he stood up and stated, "I have homework to do. I'll see you a bit later." He then walked to his room, with the ice cream still under his arm.

All this time, I had been frozen. I had never seen Toris lose his cool like that before, and to be honest, I didn't think it was possible. After he shut his door, I started on my own homework.

After a few hours, my homework was completed and Toris had apologized to me several times about his outburst earlier. I had to reassure him every time that it was perfectly fine or else he wouldn't stop apologizing.

"I think I ate too much ice cream…I can't believe I ate the entire carton..." Toris managed, lounging once again on the couch. "But let me tell you, that 'Big Gay Ice Cream Shop' makes some darn good ice cream."

"I'll have to pick some up soon, I keep hearing good things about the ice cream there," I replied while making tea. "Maybe tomorrow, it's too late right now."

Toris nodded his head. "That sounds good. I'll probably join you."

After declining an offer to travel to a local sushi bar with a few other students, I went to bed, and fell asleep pondering what adventures were waiting for me tomorrow.

* * *

A/N

Yay a new chapter! The next one might be in about a week or so, I'm still trying to juggle schoolwork and other things.

I don't speak Danish or Icelandic, so if there is a problem with the translations, let me know! I tried to find the phrases from actual speakers and not Google translate, but I'm not sure if its right or not.

Also, I'm terribly sorry for Berwald/Sweden's way of speaking; this is my first time writing how I think he would speak.

Let me know what I'm doing! As always, thank you so much for reading!

* * *

Continued in the next chapter...


	5. Wait Berwald Isn't a Scary Giant?

"I told you, we are not doing a bake sale."

"But Luke! Don't you know how many people would buy your brownies? Plus, we would raise so much money I wouldn't even have to buy 'Pin the Tail on the Donkey' sets with my own!"

"I will not work my ass off so that you can get free junk."

"But you're my best friend! Best friends help each other out!"

"Not me. Ask Emil to help."

"I already did! He told me he wouldn't!"

"Well I guess you're on your own."

"You won't even help make the cookie dough?!"

"I think I've made my point clear."

For the past half hour, both Mathias and Lukas had been arguing about their possible bake sale, which seemed positively hopeless for Mathias. Emil had been texting this entire time, while both Berwald and I stayed silent.

I had tried passing the time by working on my other homework, but the constant bickering distracted me so many times that I gave up. I was also surprised to receive two texts from Toris in just a short time period. The first read,

Delivered: 3:21 PM

From: Toris Laurinaitis

_Feliks took us to Forever 21. Please get me out of here!_

And another,

Delivered: 3:34

From: Toris Laurinaitis

_Expect that free week of lunch soon. I don't think I can handle much more._

I couldn't help but feel a little bad for him. Here I was, sitting and doing nothing, while Toris was in considerable distress. Before I could stop myself, I exclaimed, "I believe we should do something!"

I immediately caught all the attention from my fellow classmates. "But we are doing something!" cried Mathias. "I'm making plans for my bake sale…which I'll do alone," he added, shooting a dejected look in Lukas' direction.

I shook my head. "No! I mean…" I stopped, and then stood up. "We have all this wood here…I think we should create something!"

"You're…actually proposing that we work?" Emil asked disbelievingly.

He had a point there. "I know that we don't want to work, and would just rather use this class for free time…but we didn't join this class to do nothing. We joined this class to take woodshop." Okay, that was a complete lie. I joined so I could get free lunch for a week, and I already knew Emil had joined so that he wouldn't be stuck with his half-brother. "Plus, I believe it would be a good idea to create something anyway; that way if a teacher finds out we don't have a professor, we can say that we did something productive."

Someone, a very loud someone, actually agreed with me. "I agree with Tino!" shouted Mathias. "Now I can finally create my own, unmelting snowman!" He jumped over his desk and practically ran over to the pile of wood in the corner. "Let's start now!"

To my utter surprise, Berwald stood up out of his seat and without another word, walked to the pile of lumber and began taking out various pieces of wood. He then placed all of them on a work table, and then went back to grab diverse tools.

Lukas expressionlessly walked over to Mathias and began helping him pick out pieces of wood. It seemed like Mathias had absolutely no idea what he was doing, but Lukas looked as if he did.

Emil and I soon followed him. At the moment, I had no ideas of what to make, so I grabbed a random stack of wood and placed it on a work table. Emil seemed to be in the same boat as me.

"So…what do we do now?" he asked.

"You create something out of wood."

Great. It seemed as if the brothers were starting their argument again.

"I knew that! What do we make?"

"Whatever you want. You want a chessboard? Make it. You want a chair? Make it. You want a stupid unmeltable snowman? Make it."

"Hey!" cried Mathias, interrupting their argument once again. "Unmeltable snowmen are not stupid!"

"Says the idiot who set his head on fire a week ago." Lukas muttered.

"That was all Emil's fault and you know it!"

"You know damn well that wasn't my fault!" Emil screeched back. "You were the one who thought it would be interesting to Vine yourself limboing under a flaming stick!"

"You were the one who lit it!"

"You asked me to!"

"You…I couldn't have lit it by myself!"

"Yes you could've." Lukas cut in.

"Well guess what? Lighting my magnificent hair on fire has absolutely nothing to do with woodshop or my unmeltable snowman!" Mathias suddenly smirked down at Lukas. "And I bet I could make it perfect without your help!"

All this time, I had stayed silent, not really knowing what to do. Berwald, on the other hand, looked like a man on mission, for he had already started sanding a few pieces of lumber, only pausing a few times to look up at the argument taking place.

"Stop kidding yourself Mat," Lukas said as he ran his hand through his hair. As he rearranged his hair, I noticed that he had a seemingly gravity-defying curl on the side of his head. "I've known you most of your life, and that isn't even a possibility."

"You're wrong!"

Suddenly, a bizarre glint appeared in Lukas' eye. I would've said that it was the exact same kind of glint Toris had shown when he signed me up for woodshop, but Lukas made the look seem almost sinister.

"Alright Mathias Køhler. I challenge you to a bet."

Here we go again.

"If you can create your unmeltable snowman perfectly, without anyone's help, at the end of the semester, you'll owe me a favor."

"And when I _do_ make it perfectly?"

"_If_, by some magical power from another realm you are able to create it perfectly, I will owe you a single favor."

Clearly determined, Mathias stuck out his hand, which was promptly shaken by Lukas. "I accept your bet, Lukas Bondevik."

The class ended around fifteen minutes later, and once the bell rang, Emil was out of the door in a millisecond. Placing my untouched pieces of wood back on its pile, I began packing up my disregarded homework. Lukas and Mathias left soon after, which left me and Berwald alone in the same classroom, just like the day before. After packing up my chemistry book, I glanced towards him.

It looked as if he was just putting his last tool away, when he passed by Mathias' working table, which was still full of tools, various pieces of timber, and many wood shavings. Without a second thought, he began clearing his table as well.

Realizing that I was just staring at Berwald, I dropped my backpack and walked towards him. "Here, let me help!" I exclaimed. With somewhat of a confused look in his eye, he nodded and picked up the untouched wood, while I swept the unnecessary pieces into the trash. Within a minute, the table seemed as clean as it had been when we had walked in that afternoon.

"Well, that's done!" I said, not really knowing what else to say. He grunted and bent down to pick up his backpack, which I mirrored. "So, do you have any other classes after this?" I asked.

He shook his head. "N'pe. N'rmally go 'n d' h'mework n'w."

I nodded knowingly. "I do the same thing." We left the classroom without another word.

The walk back to our dorms was pretty silent; while I knew a little more about Berwald than the previous day, I wasn't completely comfortable around him. We soon reached our dorms, and with a quiet, "See you tomorrow," we parted ways.

After closing my door behind me, I placed my backpack on the kitchen table and immediately began starting on my homework.

I quickly finished chemistry, astronomy, and math when I realized that Toris hadn't come out to greet me. I checked the time, which read _5:47_, signifying that I had been working for almost two hours. Puzzled, I called out. "Toris?"

No answer.

I pulled out my phone to call him. However, I had one unread message. It read,

Delivered: 5:28

From: Toris Laurinaitis

_Sorry for the late notice, but I won't be back for a couple of hours._

There was no explanation why, which confused me. Though it was odd, I didn't want to pry; after all Toris' business was Toris' business. After typing back an, "_Okay!_" I closed my books and put my backpack in my dorm room, and then deciding it was around time to eat, I wandered back the fridge, and pulled it to find…

absolutely nothing.

Well, that's not entirely true. Occupying the fridge was a half-gallon of milk, a bag of assorted vegetables, and ranch dressing. I found the same problem when I opened the freezer, which only contained three containers of vanilla ice cream from 'Big Gay Ice Cream Shop' that Toris so dearly loved. I sighed and closed it, making a mental note to buy groceries when I had the chance, and deciding not to have carrots and broccoli for dinner, tugged on my coat and my shoes. Placing my wallet in my coat pocket, I opened the door to find the hall completely empty. Today must've been a normal study night, and not one of Mathias' party event nights.

Sighing in relief, I shut the door and began walking down the corridor, when I suddenly stopped in the hall. It was at this moment that I realized that I would be eating alone for the night, which I wasn't too thrilled about. While I was nineteen, this was only my fourth day on campus, and while I knew that I would have to do things alone in college, I would've liked to avoid my solitary, at least at the beginning of the semester.

This left me with a problem. The only people I knew in a way were Toris, Eduard, Raivis, Feliks, and those from the woodshop class. Toris, of course, was out of the equation because he hadn't returned, and so were Raivis and Eduard, for I didn't know what dorm they were residing in. While I knew where Feliks was (his bedazzled door gave him away) I wasn't going to ask him, or Emil, who would probably be eating licorice for dinner. I had no idea where Mathias or Lukas' dorms were, so the only person that was left was none other than Berwald.

I didn't head to his room right away, however. Of course I was getting hungrier and hungrier by the second, but I had told him that I would probably be busy the entire night, and I didn't want to interrupt him out of the blue! I considered randomly knocking on a door and asking whoever was there out to dinner, but I would probably make a fool out of myself.

I finally made up my mind, and began walking to Berwald's dorm, number 142. As I neared his door, I thought I heard a jaunty tune that was vaguely familiar coming from inside. I timidly raised my hand, and before I could change my mind, knocked thrice on the oak door.

The music suddenly stopped, and a second later, Berwald appeared in the doorway. He still looked exactly the same about two hours earlier, but you could physically see that he was mentally tired, probably signifying that he had been telling the truth about doing homework for the rest of the day.

"Hi Berwald!" I exclaimed. "I was going to have dinner, but I had nothing to eat and so I decided to go down to the cafeteria to eat, but then I realized that nobody was coming with me, cause Toris is out doing who-knows-what, and I really didn't want to go alone and—" realizing that I was rambling, I paused for a moment. "…I was wondering if you wanted to grab some dinner with me downstairs?" I finished.

All this time, Berwald had remained silent. His facial expression hadn't changed, except for a minute head tilt that I almost missed. After I finished, he shrugged his shoulders, then murmured, "'kay."

As I waited a moment for him to grab some cash, I thought about asking him what he had been listening to, but I remained silent. Soon, we were on our way down. I made some small talk on the way down the stairs. "Is there a certain restaurant you want to eat from? There's this really good Italian place you could try!"

I abruptly stopped after swinging the door open, for the cafeteria was packed with students. On my way to the Italian shop, titled _Pasta and Pesto_, I witnessed a male student with shoulder-length blonde hair standing on a table, seemingly reenacting a scene from Romeo and Juliet. A girl sitting at the same table with glasses and a long side braid hid her face in her hands, undoubtedly embarrassed by the dramatic thespian above her.

Dodging the people, we finally made it over to the quaint Italian restaurant. "I had the fettuccine alfredo yesterday, and it was to die for!" I whispered to Berwald. He nodded and continued looking at the menu.

Deciding what I wanted, I rang the bell on top of the counter. "Hello!" I exclaimed. As soon as the words left my mouth, the same student who had served me and Toris yesterday, popped up.

"Ciao ciao! Welcome to _Pasta and Pesto_!" Opening his eyes, he looked at me and smiled widely. "Ciao Tino!" He suddenly glanced at Berwald and the smile disappeared from his face. "W-who is your friend?!" he asked, slinking behind the counter.

"Feliciano, this is my friend Berwald," I replied, motioning up to the tall student standing behind me. He grunted in acknowledgement.

We ended up both getting the fettuccine alfredo, and sat down at the nearest table. "How is it?" I asked him excitedly, after he took the first bite.

He nodded. "G''d." He took another bite and looked at me, with just a hint of a smile on his face. "R'ally g''d."

I smiled hugely, and we continued to eat. However, the peace didn't last long, for a cry of, "EAT THIS! I MEAN LITERALLY, EAT THIS!" echoed throughout the room, and a massive food fight broke out, which resulted in people actually standing up on tables and hurling meatballs, sandwiches, ice cream, and plenty of other things at each other.

With a quick look to Berwald, I snatched up my bowl of sustenance and ran out the front door, with Berwald following me. Once the door shut behind us, the shouting and pleads of help died down. Berwald came up beside me, and one glance at him had me laughing, for apparently, he hadn't escaped without a battle wound, for a bright pink splat of something decorated the side of his face.

"Oh Berwald, I'm so sorry!" I managed to get out through my laughing. "It's just – you have something on your face!"

He pointed to the top of my head. "S' d' y'u." With a bewildered expression, my hand found its way to my hair.

"Spagetti!" I quickly ran my hands through my hair and ridded my hair of the cold pasta as Berwald wiped off the pink mess off his face.

"'ce cre'm," he mumbled. "Str'wberry."

We ended up sitting outside the building on a park bench and talked for a while. "So, how do you like woodshop?" I asked him.

He shrugged. "'ts fine. Y'u?"

I debated on whether or not telling the truth about me being in the class. "I mean, its fine. I actually wasn't going to be in the class at all; my friend signed me up for it on Sunday."

He nodded. "'re ya enj'yin' it?"

I didn't answer for a minute. "Well…I've never been that good at woodshop. I'm really grateful that there isn't a professor to grade me on it, because I'm absolutely terrible at it." I laughed lamely.

He turned to face me. "S' wh' 're ya still 'nrolled?"

"Because I signed him up for a class, and we made a bet that whoever dropped out first would buy the other lunch for a week," I admitted.

He faced forward again, nonchalantly stirring his probably now-cold pasta. "I c'uld h'lp ya if ya w'nt."

I sat up quickly. "Really? You would do that? Thank you so much!"

He nodded in response. "Mhm."

The clock stuck 8:00 PM and we both decided to head on back upstairs to our dorm rooms. Once arriving, he pulled out his key and looked at me. "Th'nks 'gain f'r 'nvitin' me."

I smiled. "You're welcome! See you tomorrow, Berwald!"

"See ya."

Once entering my dorm, I saw Toris, sitting at the kitchen table and eating. He looked up. "Oh, hello Tino! What is that in your hair?"

I laughed. "A food fight broke out in the cafeteria, and unfortunately didn't retreat unscathed." I took a closer look at him, and asked, "What happened to your shirt? There's an enormous rip in it!"

Toris looked down. "Oh this? While I was in Forever 21, Feliks somehow ripped my shirt when hold up different tops for me to try on." He ran his fingers over the cut. "I don't even know how it happened."  
"You mean you don't know how an enormous hole just appeared on your shirt?"

"I don't know! It was a sparkly…shiny…sequiny shirt, maybe there was a loose thread and it pulled or something…Anyway Feliks freaked out, and felt so bad that he took me out to dinner."

"A nice dinner, by the looks of it. You even brought leftovers!" I replied. "Speaking of leftovers, we really need to do some grocery shopping. We have nothing but milk, vegetables and ice cream."

He nodded. "We should do that tomorrow. I would do it right now, but I'm completely exhausted."

"Me too." I placed my key on the counter. "Well, I'm going to bed. See you tomorrow, Toris."  
"Goodnight, Tino!"

After taking a shower and cleaning my hair, I went to bed while pondering the following question: _"What music was Berwald listening to?"_

* * *

A/N

Yay! A longer chapter!

I think I'll make the chapters in this story a bit longer; the updates will be less often but there will be more to read!

So, what do YOU think Berwald was listening to? Did you recognize any other characters from Hetalia in the cafeteria?!

Once again, thank you all so, so, so much for taking the time out of your day to read my story! Hopefully you all are enjoying it as much as I am!

* * *

Continued in the next chapter!


	6. Hana

The next couple weeks were absolutely hectic. It seemed that college really was beginning now, for it seemed that everyone enrolled in the university was swamped with homework. The cafeteria was no longer the cheerful, carefree location of the university, for people even brought work with them to eat. There were even rumors that the students acting in the upcoming play, _Pride and Prejudice_ used their theater time to actually study for tests. There were no invites to go out to a local restaurant and Mathias' party schedule which hung on his door had been turned around, with red bold words written on the back,

"**Seriously behind on the info,**

**Don't worry, soon we'll limbo!"**

My days began to become very boring; most days I attended classes, and when finished, would mostly do my homework. On the days that I didn't have classes, I was busy either completing homework or sleeping, since I had become so sleep deprived. Not just my dorm, but the entire dorm hallway became deathly silent after class hours had ended. However, once in a while, a loud scream could be heard somewhere in the dorms, which signified that someone was overwhelmed with homework.

To my curiosity, Toris seemed to disappear after his classes. He always would come back to the room around 8 or 9 PM, and would work into the early hours of the morning. Once or twice I asked him where he was, or what he was doing, but he always gave a light laugh and would say, "Oh, it's nothing! Don't worry about it." My curiosity still remained, but I didn't want to force him to tell me.

The woodshop class basically became our study hall. I used that time to complete my physics work, and to study for any upcoming tests, as did Emil and Lukas. Mathias, on the other hand, worked non-stop on his wood creation, only pausing for breaks to answer a question or two from his humongous history book.

"Remember, we have a big history quiz tomorrow," Lukas would say once in a while. "You really could use a break and study, Mat."

"I can study later. Right now, I have the tools, the time, and the vision of my masterpiece," Mathias would respond every time. "And I know you're trying to make me study so that I don't work on my snowman."

Berwald spent his woodshop class much like Mathias; however, instead of hopping back and forth between the two activities, he would spend the entire class doing only one. Some days he spent entirely on homework, and on others, he would continually cut pieces of wood then sand them.

However, every single day of the class, before he began working, he would ask me, "G't 'n 'dea y't?"

When I sheepishly shook my head no, he would nod, head back to his desk, then start his work. I once asked for an idea from him, and he responded, "If ya m'ke s'methin' j'st c'use ya need ta, it has n' m'aning to ya. Th'nk of s'methin sp'cial th't is 'mportant."

Well. That statement certainly made me look at woodshop differently. For some reason, I began to think of woodshop as not a class, but somewhat as a haven. Yes, there were some kooky people who were enrolled in it, but for some strange reason, I believed that we all…belonged there. We all had our differences, but none of that mattered. I restrained myself from saying anything about my thoughts on our friendships, for I didn't want to make it awkward for anyone.

It was during the middle of October that something broke me out of the hectic madness that I had been trapped in for the past couple weeks. It had been a lazy autumn day, with a constant breeze that swirled the falling leaves around your feet wherever you walked. The days had begun steadily to decline in temperature, and more and more jackets were making appearances on the students on the campus.

I had gotten out of my physics class a bit earlier than usual, and had walked into woodshop, expecting it to be empty. However, I was wrong.

Standing at a work desk with his back turned back to me was none other than Berwald. From where I stood, I could tell that he was working on something very delicate, although I couldn't exactly see because of his tall stature. Intrigued, I walked into the classroom. "Hello Berwald!"

I must've spooked him, for he jumped and turned around with both eyebrows raised, which created an expression I had never seen on him before. He still blocked whatever he had been working on, however.

"H' T'no." He paused for a moment, and then continued. "'ut a bit e'rly?"

I nodded while setting my backpack down on my usual spot. "Yeah. My physics class ended a little earlier than usual." I craned my neck to the side, in hopes of seeing what Berwald had been doing before I had walked in. "If you don't mind me asking, what exactly are you working on?"

"…n'thin'."

I laughed. "Are you sure? I saw you working on something."

Defeated, Berwald nodded, and then stared at his shoes. He raised his head, with a light blush appearing on his pointed expression, probably because of embarrassment. "Ya w'nt t' see?"

I nodded while smiling and made my way towards the work table, which Berwald was still hiding from my sight. "Pr'mise n't t' l'ugh?"

Looking up at him, I nodded. "I promise."

With a nod and a quiet sigh, he stepped to the side. On top of the work table, in plain sight, was a quaint, classic dog house. The whole of it was painted white, but it had a charming yellow trimming and a black roof perched atop. It looked so well-done that I could've mistaken it as one done by a professional.

"Wow!" I exclaimed, getting a closer look at Berwald's creation. "You did all of this?" I asked, turning to face him.

He nodded slowly. "Mhm," he murmured slowly, while scratching the back of his neck.

Intrigued, I made my way slowly around the masterwork. "How long have you been working on this? I've never seen it before!"

"'bout tw' 'r three weeks. I w'rk 'n it b'fore 'nyone c'mes ta cl'ss."

I stopped, and looked up at him. "Why haven't you worked on it while in class? It's amazing!"

A ghost of a smile graced his features, and his blush darkened just a hint. "'ts k'nd 'f a s'cret."

I blinked. "Why is a dog house secret? Is it a gift for someone?"

A thoughtful expression appeared on his face. "Mm..sorta." He looked as if he would continue, but was interrupted by the three other students walking into the room, who also took notice of the endearing dog house. The class went along normally for about twenty minutes, until…

"Hm. Who are you texting, Emil?" Lukas' cool voice broke through the silence.

"N-no one!" Emil spun around, facing Lukas and thus clutching his phone to his chest. "And even if I did tell you who, you couldn't stop me."

"So you…_are_ texting someone?"

"Yes." From the corner of my eye, I could see Emil staring back at Lukas with a smug expression.

"Hmm." Lukas narrowed his eyes, and then, in a much serious tone, asked, "Who's Leon?"

Immediately Emil's smug expression disappeared, and was replaced with wide eyes and a red blush. "I-I… NO ONE!"

With the same humorless look, Lukas wordlessly reached his hand out. "Phone. Now."

Still blushing, Emil drew back from his half-brother. "No! It's mine! And you don't need to go through my messages!"

"Then tell me who Leon is and what he is to you."

"How do you really know that Leon IS a guy?!"

"Do you really think I'm that stupid enough to believe that Leon is supposed to be a girl's name? You hurt me, brother."

"What if it was short for…uh…Leona!"

At this point, I had to bite my lip from bursting into laughter. I noticed that Mathias had but his sander down and was discretely filming the two brothers.

"Just hand over the phone and then I'll stop asking."

Suddenly, Emil smirked, and exaggeratedly locked his iPhone. "Well. What are you going to do now? Even if I gave you my phone, you would never the password. Plus—"

"I figured it out yesterday. It's 'Lukas You Will Never Find This Out Cause You're Stupid'."

Emil's jaw literally dropped. "How…how…?" he managed to get out.

Rolling his eyes, Lukas said, "It wasn't that hard. Now, where were we?" He reached his hand out again.

With a speed I didn't know he possessed, Emil picked up his backpack and raced out the classroom, with his phone still in his grasp. Lukas, seemingly flabbergasted, stood still for a moment, and then dashed after him. Mathias, still recording the two brothers, hurried after them calling, "Wait up! WAIT UP!"

Berwald and I were (once again) the only two left in the classroom. We slowly looked at each other, and I promptly dissolved into laughter. I thought I was the only one laughing at first, but through my hysteric giggles, I could hear his soft chuckles. Once I had regained my composure, I straightened.

"Well…it looks like woodshop has ended for today. The other three don't seem to be coming back."

Berwald nodded and began packing up his tools. I did the same, then asked, "So, are you just going back to your dorm and doing homework like me?"

To my surprise, he shook his head. "I…" he trailed off. He looked as if he was having a mental battle in his head with what he wanted to say, judging from his thoughtful expression. "I 'ctually…" He paused again, then continued, "W'uld it j'st be b'tter if I sh'wed ya 'nstead?"

I tilted my head. "Showed me? Show me what?"

"Can ya keep a s'cret?"

A secret? Berwald wanted to share a secret with me? We had gotten dinner together and had talked around three times and now he wanted to tell me a secret of his?

I nodded. "Of course, Berwald," I replied truthfully.

Looking a bit relieved, Berwald grunted and hoisted the dog house into his hands. "Ready?"

I gathered up mine and Berwald's backpacks and looked up. "Ready!" I exclaimed as we left the classroom. We stopped at our dorms first, to drop off our backpacks, and then I followed Berwald to wherever he might go. I assumed that we were going off campus, so that Berwald could give the gift to whomever, but instead of heading in the direction of the parking lot, he began walking through the campus. Though I was extremely confused, I still followed.

To my utter confusion, he took a turn and headed to the Cottages on campus. The Cottages were somewhat like miniature houses. Around 6-8 people would share the house, and the only difference between a cottage and a dorm was the fact that only people with the same gender could share a single cottage. In the dorms, students were separated by grades; however, in a single cottage, there could be freshmen and seniors living together.

I had the choice to pick going to stay at a cottage, but I had turned it down, since living in a dorm was a little cheaper.

He passed by the Cottages all the way through, until he came to a lone gazebo, which I hadn't even known was there. It stood in the middle of a park, with a few benches around it. Lights strung the gazebo, and a white fence was built all the way around it; except for an opening, so that people could get in and out of it. Bushes with blue flower buds encircled it, and birds chirped in the sky.

"I didn't even know there was a gazebo here! Is it new?"

He shook his head. "I'm r'ally not s're. I b'lieve that people tend ta f'rget 'bout it, s'nce its so far 'way from the main buildin's on the c'mpus. I th'nk people c'me here ta read 'r study."

He finally stopped and placed the dog house practically right beside a bush encircling the gazebo. Judging from the direction where we had just come from, it would've been impossible to see.

"So…what do we do now?" I asked him, as we sat down on a nearby bench.

"Now, w' wait." Berwald gave two, short, loud whistles, which echoed through the still atmosphere.

And, absolutely nothing happened. I looked around, expecting to see a person, a dog, anything, but nothing came into view. I was about to ask him what he was expecting, when a bush began to rustle to our left. I jumped, and to my surprise, emerged a light-grey puppy, with brown legs. I gasped in a mixture of surprise and delight as the puppy began bounding over to Berwald, who was smiling faintly.

"Is this your secret?" I asked him, as the puppy began running circles around the bench, yipping all the way.

"Mmm. Ya aren't 'llowed ta h've pets on c'mpus," he responded, as he reached into his pocket. His hand emerged with half of a sandwich, which was plastic-wrapped, and immediately began breaking it up and feeding it to the dog.

"Oh. Okay." I said. "So, how long have you been feeding it?"

"F'r 'bout tw' weeks. I came h're 'ne day to eat lunch, but n'xt thing I know," he patted the dog's head, then continued, "she c'mes 'long."

I smiled and held out my hand to the puppy. She immediately began licking my hand, and I patted her head. "So you kind of became her owner?"

He nodded. "She doesn't h've a c'llar. F'gured she's just a str'y."

I smiled and nodded towards the dog house. "So you built a dog house for her?"

"Mhm."

"Have you named her?"

"No."

As soon as Berwald finished feeding her his sandwich, I stood up. "Well, we can't have her all dirty in her new clean doghouse."

Berwald raised an eyebrow at me. "What're ya sayin'?"

"I'm saying that we give her a bath!"

"How're we gonna do that? We can't take a dog in the d'rms."

"I can…I'll hide her under my jacket! Nobody will know! Also, we probably won't run into any people, since they'll probably all be doing homework."

Berwald thought this over, and then nodded. "'kay."

Smiling at him, I scooped up the puppy and with a bit of difficulty, pulled my jacket over her. "So, should we just leave the dog house here? We could bring her back after her bath.

"S'unds 'lright."

"We can wash her in my dorm, since Toris probably won't be there."

"Toris?" Berwald asked as we began walking back.

"Oh, that's right! He's my roommate; I don't think you've properly met him." There was a bark and a bit of squirming, and the dog's head popped out the top of my jacket. I laughed and replied, "Okay, but as soon as we enter the building, you're hiding!"

We soon made it to the building, and after I had hid the puppy back in my jacket, we made our way inside. As expected, there practically wasn't a student in sight, not even in the dorm hallway.

Soon, I was unlocking my dorm room. Opening the door, I exclaimed, "Thank goodness no one's here!" and looked up at Berwald.

However, his expression differed from my thankful one. He looked as if he had just come upon the most horrifying thing on the planet. I turned my back to the room and fully faced him, saying, "Oh my gosh, I'm so sorry for the mess! I should've cleaned up…" I trailed off, realizing that he wasn't even looking at me. I slowly turned around, and the image that greeted me probably gave me an expression much like Berwald's.

To be frank, Toris was making out with someone in the kitchen. The stranger had chin-length blonde hair, but their back to us, so I couldn't identify who it was. Apparently they somehow hadn't heard us come in, for they continued their activities, seemingly without a care in the world. I coughed loudly once, and Toris whipped his head around, his eyes going wide.

"Tino! I…I…uh…," he began. "This isn't what it looks like! This kinda…just…happened."

"Excuse me?!"

The blonde pushed their way out of Toris' arms and I realized that it was Feliks, who lived just a couple doors down. "This is exactly what it, like, looks like!"

A look of dread appeared on Toris' face. "That's not what I meant!"

"Just shut it already, Toris. I know what you meant." He pushed through me and Berwald, and opened the door. He looked back once more at Toris, and suddenly appeared sorrowful. "If you're embarrassed by me, let me know. I wouldn't blame you." Without another word, he shut the door, and you could hear rapid footsteps echoing through the dead-silent corridor.

Berwald and I looked at Toris, who was still in the same position we found him in, apparently shocked by the turn of events. A moment later, he dashed out the door, shutting it behind him.  
The room was silent for a couple seconds, until it was broken by a muffled yip. A light gray head once again popped out of my jacket. Trying to lighten the atmosphere, I looked up at Berwald. "I think she wants her bath now."

Unfortunately, we hadn't thought everything through. Neither Berwald or I had any dog soap, so we just decided to use dish soap instead, and wash her in the kitchen sink. I volunteered to wash her, and Berwald stood by, not really knowing what to do. The dirt gradually came off her coat, and when I had finished, I wrapped a light blue towel around her, and dried her off.

"All done!" I announced, as she licked my nose. I set her down on the floor, and she immediately began hopping around my legs, showing off her new, clean coat. "She's completely white! I had thought her coat was grey at first!"

"Must'a just been all th' d'rt," Berwald murmured, as he fed her part of a granola bar.

I sat down at the table, Berwald following suit. Realizing that I was hungry, and Berwald might be too, I asked, "Coffee?"

Berwald nodded and smiled faintly. "No cream, ple'se."

The coffee was soon created, and I literally had just placed Berwald's coffee on the table, when we were interrupted with a high, "Yip!"

The puppy apparently wanted to go back outside.

I hid her underneath my jacket yet again, and with Berwald holding both of our coffees, made the trek back to the dog house, next to the gazebo.

The sun had already set, and the sky was darkening every minute. Not a single star or even the moon made an appearance that night, but the region where the gazebo sat didn't need them. Park lamps that dotted the sidewalk glimmered with a bright glow, and the twinkle lights which strung the gazebo were fully on, which created a cheerful atmosphere.

We made our way over to the bench where we had sat earlier, and I set the dog down. She 'woofed' happily, and after noticing her new dog house, came up, sniffed it, and promptly entered her new abode and curled up in there. I suddenly turned to Berwald. "She needs a name!"

Berwald agreed with a grunt, and narrowed his eyes. "How 'bout…Susan?"

"Susan? No. She needs a unique name!" I rested my chin on my fist and stared at her. "I've got it! What about…Sardine Picnic?"

I was met with a disbelieving, bewildered look on Berwald's face. "No," he said, chuckling lightly. "I'm thinkin' 'bout Charlotte."

"Hmm…nope. That's too normal! What about…" I went from staring from the dog to the blue blossoms beside her. "What about…Go For it! Bomber!"

He shook his head.

"What about Flower Tomato?"

"Flower Tomato."

"Yep!"

"'bsolutely not. I'm not paintin' that on her h'use. I could settle f'r Flower th'ugh."

"What about another word that means Flower?"

"Like Blossom? Or in 'nother l'nguage?"

I gasped in excitement. "Oh! Definitely other language!" I paused for a moment. "But…_what _language?"

"Let's go thr'ugh a list and d'cide."

I blinked. "Oh. Okay." I pulled out my iPhone and got a list of 'flower' in other languages. "Hmm…lets see…there's _Květ_ in Czech!" I glanced at him and was greeted by a repulsive expression. "Never mind! There's _Fleur_ in French!"

A head shake.

"_Fiore_ in Italian!"

"Nah."

"_Blume_ in German!"

"S'rry."

I was getting desperate. "What about…_Hana_ in Japanese?"

This time, there was a positive reaction. "That s'unds good."

I nodded and smiled. "I think so too." I looked over to the puppy, who was fast asleep in her home. "She looks like a Hana."

I sighed and looked up at the sky. Out of nowhere, I asked, "Berwald?"

He grunted and turned towards me.

"What are you studying to become?"

"I…want to b'come a c'rpenter."

I turned towards him, smiling faintly. "Really? Why is that?"

He glanced at the gazebo. "Creatin' things are s'methin' I've 'lways enjoyed. You can take a b'ring, plain, piece of wood, and turn it into s'mething b'autiful with just a bit of 'magination." He turned to face me again. "What 'bout you?"

"I uh…I want to become an artist. A painter, specifically."

"Why's that?"

I paused, and thought it over. Finally, I murmured, "I think that sometimes, paintings can say words that people can't. People can fill their art with all sorts of emotions that words can't carry. Pictures can say a thousand words and can speak for itself."

"You s'und like a poet, not an 'rtist," he mumbled softly.

I laughed gently. "So do you." I looked up at the completely dark sky. "We should get back to our dorms. It's getting late."

"Mhm." We made our way into the building, exchanging words here and there. I found myself in front of my dorm. Looking up at him, I said, "This was nice, Berwald. I enjoyed it."

He nodded. "So did I."

I pulled my key out. "So, I guess I'll see you tomorrow?"

"Mhm."

I opened my door and looked towards him. "Goodnight, Berwald. Thank you."

"You're w'lcome. G'night, Tino."

I smiled one last time at him, and shut the door. After closing it, I leaned against it, and smiled, although I had no idea why.

* * *

A/N

Tino, you are in loooooooooove - that's why you're smiling (duh).

And Toris, dude, you don't say that in front of the dude you're currently makin' out with. Big no no.

Sorry this update was later than usual! I'm working on a thirty hour project and looking at colleges and it is kickin' my butt.

As always, thank you so much for reading! If you'd like, comment a character (introduce or unintroduced - it doesn't matter!) in the reviews, and I'll try my best to fit them in there somewhere!

Feel free to leave a review - I'm open to criticism and ideas, and any review left will brighten my entire day!

Continued in the next chapter..


	7. Oh no

_Beep! Beep! Beep! Beep!_

Eyes still closed, I sleepily reached my hand out, in a quest to mute the intolerable alarm clock. Finding it, I pressed the _off_ button, and sluggishly rolled out of my bed. Being it a Wednesday, I had no classes until 5:00 PM, which gave me quite a while to do whatever I wanted. However, I had set an alarm because I wanted to finish the majority of my homework.

Fixing my bed head, I opened my door and walked into the kitchen to find Toris already up and eating a bagel with cream cheese. "Good morning Tino!" he replied cheerfully.

I smiled and repeated the greeting, while making my way over to the coffee pot. "You seem a lot happier than last night."

A sheepish look appeared on his face. "I'm sorry for last night and the…awkwardness that came from it."

I shook my head. "Oh, you're fine. I just…" I paused for a moment. "I'm just a bit curious. I didn't know Feliks was your boyfriend."

"I don't have a boyfriend," he responded. "Lately, I had been spending more time with him, after school and such. He told me he doesn't have a car, so I became his 'personal' chauffer. We didn't do anything special, just go out shopping or eat at a restaurant. I thought him as a friend, and nothing else."

Oh, so that's what Toris had been doing all this time.

"Well, apparently, he somehow got the idea that I was…_into_ him," a deep blush spread over his face at this, "and last night, when we came back to my dorm to watch _Project Runway_, he suddenly…well…that's when you and Berwald walked in."

"Are you not into him?" I asked.

"Well, I'm not into guys. I'm straight…at least, that's what I thought when I first came to this university."

"And you're not now?" I asked again.

"I…I don't know. I mean, there's this one girl—Natalia is her name—and she's super pretty! She lives right down the hall, and sometimes she behaves like a crazy psycho ready to kill me, but if you look past that, she's amazing!" Toris suddenly burst out. "But then," he paused for a moment. "Feliks is different from another other guy I've ever met. And, well, there's what happened last night…"

Silence filled the room. "Well," I began, "Running after Feliks last night has to say something, right?"

He shrugged and leaned back in his chair. "I don't know." He suddenly looked at me. "Tino, I…have a personal question."

"Shoot!" I replied, smiling.

"I don't want to pry, but, what sexuality are you?"

He must've mistaken my silence for expiration, for he quickly said, "N-Never mind! I'm sorry if I upset you! You don't have to answer if you don't want to!"

I laughed quietly and shook my head. "I'm not upset; I'm straight," I responded.

I could've sworn that a look of disbelief or confusion came over Toris' face for a split second, but it was replaced with his normal, slightly nervous smile. "Ah, I see!" he replied. I must've imagined the doubting expression.

Toris suddenly stood up. "I need to get going, my trigonometry class starts soon." With that, he began walking to the door, which reminded me of something I wanted to ask him.

"Oh, Toris!"

He turned around with a kind smile. "Yeah, Tino?"

"I was just wondering…did you happen to catch Feliks yesterday night? You know, when he ran out the door?"

His eyes turned sullen, and his expression became so blatant that I already knew what his answer was. "No. I tried following him, but I lost him in the mob of people in the cafeteria."

"Did you try texting him?"

"Yeah. He hasn't responded." He sighed and his shoulders slumped just a bit.

"Well, I'm sure you'll see him today, and talk to him!" I said, trying to lighten the mood a little.

"We'll see." A corner of his mouth rose in an attempt of a smile. "I should be going." He looked down at his watch and his eyes widened. "I should _really_ get going."

After both saying our goodbyes, Toris walked out the door, leaving me alone in the dorm. I immediately got started on my homework.

* * *

I won't write about doing my homework, unless you want to be bored to death. After study history and answering questions for about two hours, I decided to take a break and stretch my legs. An idea suddenly popped into my head, and I gasped excitedly. "I could go visit Hana! She's probably hungry, the poor thing!" After heating up a waffle and grabbing a bag of pretzels (thankfully Toris had gone grocery shopping), I headed out the door to the gazebo.

After taking the first step outside, I immediately wanted to go back inside the building. It was already the middle of November, and the weather was cold. Snow wasn't expected until December, but it was still freezing. Thank goodness I had remembered to wear boots and a heavy jacket! I walked down the path Berwald had showed me yesterday, and passed by the quaint cottages. To my surprise, a few students were already out.

I only knew one student who was outside, and that was Emil, who was currently sitting on a low brick wall. Beside him was a male student with choppy dark brown hair. They didn't seem to be talking, and as I neared them, I realized that they were both playing Pokémon on their own separate Nintendo DS.

Wanting to be friendly, I called out, "Hello Emil!" However, he didn't seem to hear me, for his head remained down and he continued pressing random buttons on his DS. I quickly passed by them, feeling a bit foolish.

Two girls were sitting on a porch outside of a cottage on my left. The first had long, brown hair, with a wild curly strand sticking out on the right side of her head, and wore a peachy colored dress. The second girl, like the first, had long brown hair that was slightly wavy at the ends. To my surprise, it was the same girl who had been chasing the albino student with the frying pan the first day I came to campus. As I passed by them, I caught a few sentences they uttered.

"When are Pasta Boy and the German going to hook up? They were totally fawning over each other last night!" Frying Pan Girl exclaimed.

"Are you serious?! They're my otp! Where was I?!" the second girl squealed.

"You were discussing the latest chapter of Shingeki no Kyojin with Kiku," the first said without skipping a beat.

I had no idea what they were talking about, so I continued walking towards the gazebo. I walked further and further away from the cottages, and neared the clearing, and as I turned the corner, I discovered that I wasn't the first to visit Hana that morning.

Berwald sat on the bench next to the little dog house, and the puppy happily danced around him in circles. To my surprise, I also heard faint music coming from the bench that Berwald was currently sitting on, which sounded very familiar to the music that was coming from his room a couple weeks ago.

Realizing that he might turn it off when I approached him, I quickly jumped behind the nearest cottage. Miraculously, he somehow hadn't seen me, and I peeked out behind the building, straining my ears for a simple lyric of the song.

_Mamma mia, here I go again_

No.

_My my, how can I resist you?_

No.

_Mamma mia, does it show again?_

No. There was no way that big, scary, intimidating Berwald Oxensteirna was listening to ABBA.

_My my, just how much I've missed you_

Yes, Berwald was most assuredly listening to _Mamma Mia_ by ABBA. Unable to control myself, I covered my mouth, trying to stifle my laughter. I never expected that Berwald, with the piercing glare and the deep voice would be caught dead listening to ABBA while playing with a puppy. Controlling my laughter, I peeped my head out again. Berwald had now moved from his position on the bench and was now sitting on the grass, petting the puppy, who was laying on her side. A smile had also appeared on his face, and I had to admit, he looked very cute doing that.

What?

I pulled my head back and rested my back against the building. Cute? Where in the world had that come from? Had I just really called Berwald cute?!

Don't get me wrong, I acknowledge actors like Benedict Cumberbatch or Chris Evan being handsome. There's nothing wrong saying that someone looks good; I just hadn't ever thought of a guy as _cute_ before…

I shook my head, a bit confused where that had come from. I mean, I wasn't into guys; I had just told Toris this morning that I was straight. I wasn't into guys. I wasn't into guys. I wasn't into Berwald.

Still trying to shake my head of these thoughts, I walked back through the way I had come, making sure to stay out of Berwald's sight, my now-cold waffle and pretzels long forgotten.

* * *

For the remainder of my day, I had resided in my room, contemplating what on earth I had been thinking. After a couple of hours, I had gone back to Hana's dog house and had fed her my pretzels, trying to clear my mind. When my five o'clock art class came along, I had cleared my head and was ready to learn.

My art class, while very small and smelled of too much paint, was extremely important to me. It was a place where I could let my imagination run wild, and do what I loved – to paint. Occasionally, my art professor would have us sculpt or draw, but painting beat them both by far.

My art professor was an eccentric man who was very much like art itself. At one moment, he would explain something so meaningful and poetic, like a dignified portrait or beautiful scenery. At the next would become so hyper or passionate about something as if he was a crazy piece of modern art. His appearance was just like his personality; most of the time he would show up in a suit, but there were some days where he would come wearing a cowboy outfit, or a pirate's costume. Strangely, he also had two wild curls in his hair.

What was it with weird hair curls at this school?

"Halt, who goes there?!"

It seemed as if he had gone with his 'crazy' personality today, for he wore a Roman gladiator suit, complete with a spear that looked pretty real. It also was pointed straight at me.

"Uhm, Tino Väinämöinen?" I squeaked.

"Oh, then come on in, soldier! Take a seat!" he boomed, then let me pass through the door.

I took the seat in the back of the classroom and looked around. I wasn't exactly social in the class, so I hadn't really bonded with any of the students there. Feeling a bit more outgoing than usual, I turned to the student on my right. "Hello!" I exclaimed.

The student turned around, and from the looks of him, I knew he would be a colorful character indeed, for his feet were currently resting on his desk, and was munching on a big, red tomato.

"Eh? What do you want?" He grumbled, still chewing his tomato. His eyes were the color of a bright peridot stone, and he had dark brown hair, with a strange, long curl, almost exactly like Feliciano Vargas, the student who worked at the Italian food stand on campus. Actually, his whole appearance looked a lot like Feliciano. However, his demeanor said, "I don't give a damn about anything."

"I was just saying hello!" I replied. He 'hmphed' and got back to eating his tomato, thus ending the conversation. So much for being social.

Luckily, the class got underway, and the professor began the class. Art never seemed long to me, since I enjoyed it that much. The class wasn't out of the ordinary; we learned about the under painting of portraits and other aspects of the sort. However, near the end of the time period, the professor proclaimed,

"Now, let's start talking about the semester project!"  
Semester project? Oh, those are always fun. Can you detect my sarcasm?

"I want you to create a piece of art. It can be a painting, a drawing, a sculpture, a picture, anything!"

I immediately perked up at these words. I could paint whatever I wanted for a project?! This was awesome!

"However," he continued, "this piece of artwork has to mean something to you." He began strolling through the classroom until he stopped in front of the student I had been talking to before class, who was on his sixth tomato. "For example," he gestured to the student, "Lovino Vargas cannot paint a tomato simply because he enjoys eating them."

A few snickers broke out in the room, and Lovino glared up at the professor, blushing madly. "Vai a farti fottere!" he shouted.

I was expecting the professor to yell back at him, but he just replied with, "Non dimenticate che io parlo italiano," and with that, continued with his lecture. "While food is important to you, people should be considered more." It was at this point that he shot a tender glance towards Romano. "So I want to see some emotion in this project. Friends, family, pets, significant others, you get what I'm saying."

The bell rang, and the students began piling out of the classroom. I finished packing away my various things and exited the classroom. I began walking back to my room, wondering what exactly I was going to do for my art project. There was no doubt, I would be painting, but I had no idea what exactly I was going to paint.

Deep in thought and keeping my head down, I wandered down the hall, heading to the cafeteria. Suddenly, I bumped shoulders with someone heading the opposite way of the corridor and looked up.

"We seem to bump into each other often," I replied, smiling up at Berwald.

He nodded and held up his phone. "S'rry. I was t'xtin' and wasn't looking where I was goin'."

I shrugged. "It's nothing! My head was looking down as well." I was suddenly reminded of him sitting with Hana listening to ABBA and to my horror, I could feel my face getting hotter.

Trying to hide the blush that I knew had formed on my face, I gestured towards the cafeteria. "Have you already eaten yet? I was just about to get some dinner! Would you want to come with me?"

He nodded his head. "I'll come with ya."

I smiled and began walking towards the cafeteria, just a little further ahead than Berwald, so that he wouldn't see my now fading blush. Why had that image suddenly popped into my head?

We ended up getting food from the Mexican stand on campus, and sat down at a table. There was hardly anyone in the cafeteria at the time. Feliciano, who was working at the Italian food stand, was currently talking to a big, burly blonde student who looked like he could beat someone to a pulp in no time. Three students sat at a table on the other side of the room, and were extremely different from one another. The first I recognized as the dramatic thespian from a couple weeks earlier and the second was the Albino student who was chased by the frying pan girl at the beginning of the school year. The third had slightly curly brown hair, and tanner skin than the other two, and had a pile of tomatoes sitting in front of him.

We kept up a conversation as we ate concerning how our days went. However, every twenty seconds or so, Berwald's phone would buzz, which was most likely receiving a text. "Who are you texting?" I wondered aloud, smiling softly.

He quickly looked at his phone and put it in his pocket. "It's Mathias." He seemed like he didn't want to continue the conversation, so I moved on to a different subject.

"So Berwald, what kind of music do you like?" I asked, trying to sound casual.

"All s'rts of music. I like Sw'dish House M'fia," he murmured.

While this wasn't the answer I was hoping for, I nodded. "What other kinds of music?" I tried again, still trying to sound curious.

It was his turn to blush, for a light pink dusted over his sharp features and he scratched the back of his neck. "You'd l'ugh."

I shook my head. "I promise I won't. You can tell me anything," I added, smiling at him.

"I re'lly like ABBA. A lot," he blurted out all at once. The blush deepened and he looked away, most likely embarrassed.

I had expected this answer, but played it off like I hadn't. "Really?! I do too! What's your favorite song by them?"

The look on Berwald's face was priceless. Apparently he hadn't expected my reaction, for his eyes were wider than I had ever seen them, and his mouth was slightly open.

I would've been lying if I had said that his look didn't affect me, for my heart flip-flopped in my chest and then began racing. I bit my lip, trying to hide the giddy grin that had formed on my face.

"Y' can't just pick 'ne song. There's s' many amazin' ones," he finally seemed to have come over his shock, and for the next half hour, we discussed their different songs, and both expressed our dream of ABBA reuniting. To my surprise, Berwald wasn't just a normal fan, he was hardcore fan. He knew every single song they had ever come out with, along with their lyrics, and the year every song had come out. I was impressed, to say the least.

After telling the other our favorite song from the popular 70's band, Berwald's phone went haywire, suddenly buzzing every two seconds or so. His normal, glaring expression turned into an annoyed one as he looked up at his phone.

"Is it Mathias again?" I asked, giggling at how absurd he was receiving messages.

"Yeah." Evidently he had had enough, and silenced his phone. "He's been t'xtin' me nonstop f'r the past c'uple days."

"Why?" I asked curiously.

He shrugged. "'bout tips on woodshop. N'thin' much."

After finishing our meals, we headed back on up to our rooms, partly because the trio in the cafeteria had begun a singing competition that would've made someone's ears bleed.

Right before we both entered our separate rooms, Berwald suddenly pulled his phone out and faced me. "Do I h've your number? We seem to be seein' each other 'ften."

I tilted my head. "No, I don't believe you do."

He stayed still for quite some time, and after a moment or two, raised his eyebrows. "Hm?" he grunted questioningly.

"Oh!" I exclaimed, astonished at how slow I was. "Are you asking for my number?" I asked him, a slight smirk plastered on my face.

Berwald nodded with a sheepish grunt, and I, in turn, gave him my number. As he put the numbers into his phone, I couldn't help but mutter, "I can't believe I didn't catch your drift. I'm so slow." I laughed quietly.

Berwald suddenly stopped, and looked down at me. "Don't s'y that. You're not sl'w."

I smiled lopsidedly up at him. "You don't think so?"

"I think you're the f'rthest thing 'way from it. And I mean it."

My blush made a grand reappearance, and my heart probably started beating a million times a minute. I didn't quite know how to respond to a compliment like that, so I just uttered a, "Thank you," lamely.

He began opening his door, until I stopped him. "Wait!"

"Hm?" he paused.

"It wouldn't be right unless I got your number too!" It only was fair that I got his number as well. It would be pretty awkward for only him to have mine, and he did have a point: we were seeing each other pretty often. While I was still close to Toris, I had been spending much more time with Berwald, and if I had to pick a closest friend at the moment, it probably would've been Berwald.

After giving me his own number, he said our goodbyes and headed into our separate rooms. After closing the door, I leaned against it, much like the night before. However, unlike yesterday, my face was contorted into a confused scowl in absolute dubiety. I debated in my head what to do next, and the next thing I knew I was calling for my roommate. "Toris!"

Toris came walking in the kitchen, with a bowl of ice cream in his hands. "Oh, hello Tino! I was expecting you a bit earlier…" he suddenly noticed my expression. "Is everything okay?"

I sighed and dropped my backpack near the door. Realizing that I probably still looked a little angry, I smiled lightly. "I just…need your help with something. I'm just a little…confused."

A puzzled look appeared on Toris' face, and there was just a tinge of alarm in his viridescent eyes. "Is everything okay, Tino?"

"Everything is fine," I assured him. "It's just…have you ever called another male cute?" I blurted out.

"Um, no I haven't," he responded, his bowl of ice cream completely forgotten. "But one time I did call Feliks cute when he tried on a skirt at Forever XII."

"But you normally don't call someone…a male…who is listening to ABBA and playing with a puppy cute?"

Toris paused for minute, his eyes narrowing just a hint. "Not really…" he responded. "Unless," he continued, "you're into that certain person."

No.

No.

No.

I was so screwed.

* * *

A/N

Hello! I'm back!

I'm super sorry this chapter is a bit later than usual, but I bet you all enjoy it!

And if it wasn't clear before, Tino and Lovino's art professor is Grandpa Rome.

Oh, and before I forget, I have a beta! Check out LeaveMeWithMyShips! She's an amazing author and you should all check out her stories!

Once again, thank you all for reading!

Review?

* * *

Continued in the next chapter..


	8. Shoot I'm Gay

To be perfectly honest, I didn't sleep well that night. Snippets of ABBA lyrics bounced around in my brain while I tossed and turned. Apparently I fell asleep in the night, and when I woke up at 5:00 AM I decided to get up for the day.

Feeling more productive than yesterday, I decided I would take a quick jog around the campus before any of my classes started. Putting on sweats and a jacket, I quietly tiptoed through the small dorm, my miniscule steps almost sounding like stomps. I finally made it to the living room, where Toris was sprawled out on the couch, sleeping. His bowl of melted ice cream still sat upon his lap, apparently forgotten.

After dumping the remnants of Toris' precious vanilla ice cream, I grabbed my key and headed towards the corridor. No one was in sight, but you could hear a faint conversation coming from one of the dorms. Since it was so quiet, I couldn't tell if it was a TV, or actual people.

Making my way downstairs, I could already tell that some people were getting ready for their day. Many people were already inside the restaurants getting their food ready, and few students sat at tables, accompanied with a thick school book and a Venti cup of coffee, studying most likely. A soft, soothing piano tune echoed throughout the cafeteria.

A classy, sepia colored poster adorned the message board in the cafeteria. Upon it were the words,

_Come and see the timeless tale, Pride and Prejudice, put on by the students of Hetalia University! Tickets on sale now!_

Oh, so there was a play coming soon? I made a mental note to look into getting tickets.

I slipped out the door and began jogging. I won't go into much detail here, for I bet it would be pretty boring if I wrote, "I jogged, jogged some more, took a sip from the water fountain, then jogged some more." After circling the entire campus a few times, I decided that I should get started for the day, and returned to the dorm building.

Tiredly stumbling up the stairs, I realized that the hallway was completely different from the hallway that I had seen this morning. At first I thought I had fallen down a rabbit hole and had landed in Wonderland, for the scene in front of me could've been found in a crazy, alternate universe. Posters covered almost every inch of the corridor, excluding the patterned green carpet and the low ceiling. Even the doors were covered by them! My mouth dropped as I stared around the room, and walked to get a closer look at the posters, which were the same 'Pride and Prejudice' posters I had seen this morning. I couldn't spend any more time ogling the bizarre sight, for a high, irritated voice rang out.

"Aw, _hell_ naw!" An irate Feliks cried as he stared in horror at the sight. "Which bastard covered up my bedazzled door?!" In a fury, he began ripping off the posters with strength and a speed I didn't even know was possible for him. Wanting not to be blamed for the deed, I quietly opened my door and soundlessly entered while his back was turned to me. Toris was off of the couch, and was probably taking a shower at the moment. After taking my own shower, I gathered up my books and completed homework, walked out the door, and began my school day.

"Got 'ny ideas yet?"

I suddenly looked up towards the voice over my right shoulder and smiled sheepishly. "No…not yet."

Berwald nodded once and said nothing. I stayed silent, so the atmosphere was pretty awkward. He looked like he wanted to say something, but strode away with long steps. I stared after him for a moment or so, but then looked back to my empty desk. The tiny room was uncommonly quiet this afternoon, only an occasional sigh or the hum of a machine broke the silence. Mathias and Emil had both started on their projects; Mathias had several parts of the snowman's body already cut and laid out, while Emil seemed to be carving away, little by little into a somewhat small piece of wood. At the moment, his sculpture was unidentifiable. Lukas, on the other hand, gazed at a block of wood, as if expecting that it would suddenly contort into a bench or something like that.

I shut my eyes and scrambled my brain, trying to think of _something_ I could create. A table? No, too common. A chair? No, too challenging. A model of the city of Gondor from Lord of the Rings? Too…weird. Opening my eyes and pulling my mouth into a frown, I gazed across the room once more, trying to get any ideas. My eyes landed on Berwald, who was currently sanding a birdhouse he had created in just over two weeks. Before I knew it, I had gotten up out of my chair and was currently walking towards him.

Berwald looked just as surprised as I felt when I came up beside him. "Your birdhouse looks so professional-looking!" I whisper-shouted to him, as I pointed to his oeuvre, not really knowing what else to say.

He ducked his head in bashfulness, but wasn't fast enough for me to catch the sight of his light blush. "Thanks." He returned to sanding the roof of the birdhouse.

"H-Hey, Lukas! Look!" We turned to find Mathias balancing two of the three wooden spheres on his head, with the largest one being around the size of a soccer ball. "Dontcha think I could make it in the circus, Luke? Huh?" He asked excitedly as he looked around the room.

"Ah, yes. You would be perfect in the circus, Mat," Lukas said, not looking away from his block of wood.

"Really?! You think so?!"

"Of course. You have every characteristic of a typical, simpleminded, grotesque clown. Personally, I don't know why your parents didn't name you Ronald McDonald."

For a split second, an extreme look of hurt appeared on Mathias' face, which was so unlike his carefree, happy smile that I almost did a double take. I don't believe anyone but I saw the abnormal sight, for Emil and Berwald were busy on their projects, and Lukas hadn't looked up from the beginning. It was quickly replaced with his normal, laughing smile. "Come on, man! Of course they wouldn't name me something like that!" He paused, taking the spheres off of his head and flexing his arms. "I'll have you know that 'Mathias' literally means, 'Gift of God!'"

"Sure, whatever you say."

"No, really!"

Turning around, I began to again watch Berwald sand his birdhouse. With a tiny smile, I realized that he was humming, 'Voulez Vous'.

"So, what color are you thinking of painting it?" I asked with interest.

He stopped his quiet humming and pursed his lips. "…'M thinkin' of a royal blue 'nd a light blue—"

Suddenly, a piercing cry of, "Oh, lort!" and a clatter of noises broke through our conversation. Confused and even a bit frightened, I took a startled step back from Berwald and his project, eyes going wide. This proved to be my downfall. Literally, my downfall. As my foot came down, I happened to step on something behind me, and the next thing I knew, I had the wind knocked out of me, and had fallen on my back.

With Berwald on top of me.

My gasp could've been taken as a sign of lack of oxygen, but this wasn't the case. I quickly realized that we were pressed together in almost every single way possible. Our legs were helplessly tangled together, and we were practically nose-to-nose. But the thing that took my breath away was the fact that Berwald was staring right at me, with his beautiful, Caribbean blue eyes. I breathed out, all at once, which fogged up his glasses.

"Oh my gosh, are you guys alright?!"

Mathias' voice shook us both out of our stupor, and Berwald began to stand him. He planted both hands on the floor beside my chest, and got to his feet. He held out a hand, which I gratefully accepted. "We're alright," I answered when I had stood up. "What exactly happened?"

It was at this time that Lukas spoke for Mathias. "Mathias was just telling me about his name when he dropped one of the parts of his snowman." He nodded at said one, which lay a few feet away from where we had been laying a moment ago. "Tino, you stepped on it, and when you began falling, Berwald tried to stop you by grabbing your arm, but you pulled him down with you."

At those words, my face broke out in an embarrassed, scarlet blush. "I…I don't even remember how I ended up on the ground!" I looked up to a stoic-faced Berwald. "I'm so sorry! I didn't mean for you to fall as well!"

"'s fine. I'm s'rry I couldn't catch ya in time."

"Mathias should be the one apologizing. He's the klutz who started this whole ordeal," Lukas stated dryly as he stared at Mathias." Suddenly, the clock rang four times, signifying the end of the hour.

"Well, this has been very nice, but I need to be leaving," announced Emil, as he packed up his supplies, leaving his unfinished carving on the work desk.

"Where are you going?" Lukas' big brother instincts once more made an appearance as he got up from his seat.

"I'm meeting up with a friend."

"And would that friend happen to be this Leon who I haven't met?"

"So what if it is? And that's your own fault; you've never asked to meet him!"

"Well, may I meet him now?"

"Um…no." And with that short answer, Emil dashed out of the room.

Lukas turned back to Mathias. "You need to help me follow him."

"What? There's no way! I have my 'bobbing for apples' tournament later tonight!" he responded enthusiastically. "I can't miss it! And you told me you would help me!"

Lukas narrowed his eyes. "When did I ever say that?"

"Last night you told me that you would do something for me if I left you alone while you did your homework! And I definitely need help with this!"

Lukas heavy sighed and rubbed his temples. "You know what? Fine. I'll help with your idiotic competition." He retrieved his backpack and stood back up. "Is there anything you need me to pick up?"

"No, I should have everything!"

"Do you have the apples?"

"Oh…I must've forgotten about those."

"What about buckets?"

"It's a good thing I've got you around, Luke!"

He once more rolled his eyes and took a deep breath. "Alright, here's the plan. I will go and buy buckets, you will go and buy apples. Okay?"

Mathias nodded. "Apples…got it!" He rushed out the door with Lukas on his heels.

All throughout this, I had stayed silent, as had Berwald. I hummed thoughtfully. "They're an odd pair, don't you think?"

"Hm." He agreed.

_Boom, boom, boom!_

A loud pounding on the door broke me from my concentration as Toris came running from his room with a confused look on his face. "Who could that be?" he wondered aloud.

"I'm not exactly sure," I responded as I got up out of my chair. "It probably could be anybody," I added, as I walked over to the door. Pulling it open, I discovered that the person at my door could truly be anyone.

If I had to guess, I would have to say that the student was around six feet tall. His pale, ashen blonde hair was slightly wavy, and had accenting violet eyes with a very prominent and distinctive nose. A calm, gentle smile rested on his soft features; however, that didn't make me feel calm at all.

"Freshman meeting in the hall in two minutes," he said with a strong Russian accent. "No exceptions whatsoever, da?" he added, shooting a smiling glance over my shoulder, mostly likely to Toris.

A yelp sounded behind me, and the student at the door moved to the right, preferably to notify Berwald in the next dorm. Leaving the door open, I turned around to witness Toris, who looked as if he'd seen a ghost. "Toris, are you…are you alright?"

He jumped at my voice, with his eyes going wide. "Yes, I'm alright!" he squeaked, pulling on shoes by the door, still shaking a bit. Before walking out of the door, he turned around to me. "I'll leave right now, I want to see if I can find Felix…" he added, his voice growing softer near the end of his sentence.

I nodded and smiled, laughing a bit. "Of course! Go on ahead!"

He gave me another smile, then exited into the hall, which was rapidly growing noisier and nosier by the minute. Figuring that it would be better to go out now and not later, I also slipped on my blue Converse shoes and shut the door behind me.

The still poster-covered hallway was already swarming with people. Most people paid no attention to the peculiar sight (probably because they already knew about it), while others looked around in shock, confusion, and even a miniscule hint of awe. Most students were talking, but one blonde male in a green jacket and a peculiar white beret seemed to be frantically looking for something (or someone). Toris was across and down the hall, talking to what seemed like an irate Feliks. Six girls, who were extremely different from each other, burst into the room, with one calling out, "The fuuuuun has arrived!" One of the girls was a short blonde, with a purple ribbon in her hair, and once she stepped into the hall, she was bear-hugged by the student in the green jacket from before.

The burly Russian student had apparently delivered his message to all of the freshman, for he disappeared into a room down the hall. Berwald suddenly stepped out of his room, right beside me.

"Oh, hello!" I looked up at him, smiling.

"Evenin'," he responded, with a small smile of his own. "Do ya know what's goin' on?"

"I don't," I said, shaking my head. "It must be important though, since the entire freshmen class on campus are supposed to meet. I wonder if there is a party being planned!"

"Even the st'dents from the c'ttages 're here…must be 'mportant," Berwald mumbled, squinting his eyes and gazing around the room.

"All right, everyone against the wall." The Russian's voice echoed throughout the hall. The corridor suddenly got very quiet and still.

"The fuck?" Lovino, a little ways to my left cursed loudly in confusion. "What the hell do you mean, 'against the wall?!"

"Yeah! That sounds like a line from a bad porno!" A distinctively German, grating voice rang out, which resulted in a few laughs.

"Listen, I don't want to be doing this either," the massive student responded with a sigh, with his head drooped a little. "But if you don't do as I say, I'm going to have to _make_ you do as I say." His head popped back up as the words came out of his mouth. His childish smile was still in place, but his eyes were full of malevolence.

Many students near him cowered away in fear, and Lovino even hid behind a student with slightly curly brown hair, who was currently eating a tomato. Students hesitantly stepped back until their backs hit the wall. Berwald looked as if he didn't want to please the fearsome student, for he had locked his eyes with him and was the last one to obey his command.

A moment later, the Russian student was back to 'normal', and he giggled. "Now, everyone's ready? Good. Let's begin the meeting."

And then, to my utter surprise, even he stood against the wall, as if someone else was running the meeting. Someone coughed, and all was still.

A person, clad in a Captain America jacket stepped out of the same door the Russian student had gone in just a few minutes before. A cowlick stuck out of his dirty blonde hair, and his glasses reflected the bright lights of the hallway. I realized that it was the student who had been on his way to McDonalds I had seen a few weeks earlier.

"First of all, I must thank my classmate Ivan, for calling everyone here together. It must've been hard." He nodded in thanks to the burly student, who smiled and nodded back to him. He then continued, "My fellow freshmen, as many of you know, my name is Alfred F. Jones." He began walking down the corridor, and continued, "I have called this meeting of the freshmen here today because of something tragic that occurred on this very day!" His voice rose at the end of his sentence, and then he took a long sip from his large McDonalds cup. "Such a deed is prohibited by the school, and the culprit could and should be kicked out of the school!"

Gasps echoed throughout the room, and my eyes widened. I stood on my tiptoes and whispered to Berwald, "What do you think they did?!"

Before he could answer, however, Alfred continued. "I brought this deed to the attention of the Principle, and now it is my job to find out who did this and why they did this! For once, I will be the hero and bring justice to all!" To emphasize his point, he slammed his cup into the palm of his glove-covered hand, and looked around the room. He was then silent, and stared up and down the room, staring hard at each, individual person.

A girl clad in a light blue dress and long, dark pigtails cried out, "Well, tell us what they did!"

Alfred whipped himself around. "I will tell you what they did!" he shouted dramatically.

"Did they murder someone?!"

"Did they steal something?"

"Oh my god sOMEONE ATE FELICIANO'S PASTA—"

Apparently the pressure was just too much for some people, and once a guess rang out, many absurd ones followed. The peace and quiet was quickly restored however, when Ivan once more stepped into the hallway. Alfred continued.

"This crime the culprit has committed is the worst—"

Gasps.

"—possible thing—"

Nervous looks shot around.

"—ever—"

People shook in their boots.

"—to clean up!"

Wait. What?

"The person who covered this entire hallway with _Pride and Prejudice_ posters may have the tenacity of a bulldog and the will of a warrior, but covering the entire freshmen dorm hall is way out of line!"

You could literally hear a pin drop in the hallway. People's mouths were even opened; nobody even moved.

"Are you…_bloody_ serious?" 'Artie' stammered out. "You brought everybody out here, just to tell them the blatant obvious?!"

"But this is a crime! It's prohibited to cover up doorways with any sort of item! But trust me, Arthur, I will find this madman and bring him to justice! Do we have a confession, people?!"

People looked as if they were just about to leave when a very loud voice shouted, "Almost there, Luke! Do you think I should've bought green apples? Will they be fine with red ones?" Mathias and Lukas walked into the corridor and looked around.

"Oh, look! They're all lined up waiting for my 'bobbing for apples' contest! I told you they were looking forward to this, Lukas!"

"Actually, that's not the case." Alfred turned around and walked towards Mathias. "I'm actually conducting an investigation at the moment, which requires all of the freshmen here, so you might need to move your tournament."

"Uh, that's not what the weekly schedule says!" Mathias dropped his bags of apples onto the dark carpet and pointed at the schedule hanging on his door. The current day read, "BOBBIN' FOR ALL DA APPLES TOURNAMENT!" In smaller words, read, "PS make sure to buy lots of apples."

"We don't need to listen to this schedule. That's yours, not all of ours. And besides, this investigation is waaay more important that your competition, dude." Alfred crossed his arms and took another sip of his drink.

Mathias, in short, looked pissed. "You…you can't do this! I reserved this night for MY tournament!"

Alfred turned around and began walking to the other side of the hall. "Listen, I'm real sorry for the coincidence, but this is just more important than your—ow!"

At the exclamation, I leaned my torso outwards to see what had happened. A shiny red apple lay beside Alfred, who was currently rubbing the back of his head. I moved my gaze to where Mathias and Lukas stood, and found myself staring at an uncanny sight. An absolutely livid Lukas stood next to a bag of opened apples and was breathing heavily. He picked up another few apples and began walking towards the hero-wannabe.

"I did not spend…five hours with this idiot…buying apples and buckets…to come back and hear…that we can't put on this stupid tournament…!" Every couple seconds, he would chuck another apple at Alfred who tried his best to dodge them. Unfortunately for him, Lukas had near-perfect aim.

Mathias had woken from his stupor and had also begun to pick up apples and throw them at Mathias. Tried to throw them, at least. The first one sailed over his head and hit a boy with a long, dark ponytail, and the second swerved to the right and hit a student's head who's shirt said, 'I love cats' who had apparently fallen asleep with his head leaning on the wall. He didn't wake up. The one with the ponytail screeched and glared daggers at Mathias.

I should've seen it coming. I should've realized that the students were tired and angry, and should've run back into my dorm, and warned the others, but I was too late, for the biggest food fight of my life broke out at that very moment. People left the wall as though it was fire, and began grabbing apples from the end of the hall and chucking them at whoever was unfortunately in aim. People ran back into their dorms and returned with armfuls of food and drinks and began throwing them at random people.

A humungous piece of broccoli suddenly came into my view, and I realized that it was coming straight at my head. I dove before it could it me, and I was thrown into confusion. People were yelling, screaming even, and I didn't dare stand back up in fear of being hit with who knows what. I tried to look for my door, but they all seemed practically identical with the posters covering them.

A hand clamped over my wrist, and I was pulled to my feet and was just about dragged to a door. "Hey—!" I began to shout.

I looked up to find Berwald, the person who I would consider to be my savior at the moment. "Let's get 'utta here!" He yelled over the commotion, and opened the door closest to us. I almost shouted, "Are you stupid?! It won't open unless you have a key to the room!" However, the door swung open easily, and after pushing me in, he followed then shut the door behind us, leaving us in darkness.

"Hey! What are you two doing here? This is our hiding spot!"

"Oh, _our _hiding spot. I like that, _mon cheri_."

"If you don't stop calling me that, I will—"

"Wait, who's there? Where are we?" I asked blindly.

The first voice answered, and responded, "We're in the janitor's closet. I'm Lucille and this pervert next to me is Francis."

"You hurt me with your words, Lucy…"

"It's true though! You couldn't have 'accidentally' groped me twice in here already.

Like Lukas and Emil, they began bickering, and I blocked them out. I looked around the room, trying to adjust my eyes to the darkness. "Um…T'no?" Berwald's voice murmured.

"Yeah?"

"Do ya want to move?"

I tilted my head in confusion, and then realized that I was once again pressed right against Berwald. Our chests were pressed together, and my feet were in danger of stepping on his. One of his hands still rested on my wrist, and the other had somehow found its way to my waist.

"There's…there's not that much space to begin with…" I managed to get out, and tentatively tried to step further into the closet, only to step on what felt like another foot.

"Ow! That's my foot!"

"S-Sorry!" I silently cursed, realizing that there literally was no room to move. "Berwald, I can't move," I murmured quietly.

"Its fine. J'st hope this 'rdeal is 'bout over." He pressed his ear to the thick door and listened for anymore commotion, eyes shutting as well.

In my quest to move, my t-shirt had apparently ridden up on the side, and Berwald's hand was now touching my bare skin. I inwardly shivered and sucked in a breath as a shock of excitement ran up my arms and down my legs. Berwald must've not noticed, for he didn't remove his hand and continued to listen.

Suddenly he removed his head and opened the door. "Must've ended," he mumbled. Sure enough, as he opened the door, the food fight was apparently over. Food splatters covered the once sepia posters and the carpet was no longer the dark green color, but a rainbow of colors. He stepped out and almost to my disappointment removed his hand. I immediately pulled down my shirt and stepped out behind him, Lucille and Francis following me. Seeing them both in the light, I almost did a double take. "Wait, are you two the ones on the poster?!"

Francis nodded with a prideful smile upon his face. "Oui, I am playing Mr. Darcy, and this lovely lady beside me is playing the delectable Elizabeth Bennet."

Lucille had a deadpan expression. "I actually have to 'believably' fall in love with him. It sickens me." And with that, she walked down the corridor, and out of the door. She must've been staying at a cottage, rather than a dorm. Francis sighed sadly and made his way to his own room.

"I…guess we should go back to our own rooms," I said quietly, still a bit out of breath from before.

He hummed and nodded, trying to figure out which door was his.

"Thank you for saving me back there," I scratched the back of my head awkwardly, laughing a little. "Thanks to you, I got away unscathed!"

One of the corners of his mouth lifted a tiny bit, resulting in a half smile. "No pr'blem. Wouldn't want ya gettin' hurt, Tino."

I looked at the ground, hiding my smile as well as my blush. "Well, I'll see you tomorrow, Berwald."

He got out his key from his jean pocket and hummed another time. Before he could swing open his door, however, two different thoughts popped into my mind. "Oh, Berwald!"

He immediately turned around with a questioning look on his face. "Ya?"

"Who's your roommate?"

"S'meone named Vash Zwingli. He was the 'ne in the green j'cket and wh'te barret."

"Ah," I responded, nodding lightly. "I remember seeing him tonight." I paused for a moment, then asked the second thing on my mind. "And…I'll try to think of something to create in woodshop soon. I promise."

Satisfied with my promise he smiled again and nodded, once more pulling open his door. "I'll see ya tomorrow, Tino."

"Goodnight, Berwald." And with that, we parted ways into our separate rooms. Like the nights before, I leaned against my door, my blush growing deeper and even more scarlet as my mind thought of the crazy events today. I sighed, my eyes closing.

I was definitely in trouble. I had been pressed against Berwald for two times in one day. And I had really, really enjoyed it.

Damn it.

* * *

*Rises from the grave* I LIIIIIIIIIVE

Hey all you lovely people! I am so sorry I haven't gotten the chance to upload more of this story, school and graduation literally ate up my life these past couple months. Don't worry, this summer I will be updating much more! Soon, I am thinking of starting my next Hetalia multichapter story, either a Dennor one, or a FraMon (France x Monaco) one...what are your thoughts?

Oh! And by the way, Aph Monaco doesn't have a canon name, so in my stories, if you see the name 'Lucille', that's Monaco. Just clarifying! :)

Once again, thank you so much for reading!

Continued in the next chapter..


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